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. AROUND THE WORLD, VIA SIBERIA, by Nicholas 
Senn, M. D., Professor of Surgery in Rush Medical College, 
Chief of Operating Staff with the Army in the Field during the 
Spanish- American war, and Surgeon-General of Illinois; pp. 402, 
and nearly 100 half-tone engravings; $1.50. W. B. Conkey 
Company, Hammond, Ind. 



The author is an experienced and observant traveler, and 
writes, with refreshing vigor and picturesqueness, a particularly 
interesting description of the various places traversed in the 
journey; with the most reliable information to be obtained on 
matters concerning government and policies, people, manners 
and customs, religions, laws, learning, arts, industry, commerce, 
and literature. Dr. Senn is a trained observer, and we have 
here the clear, fresh, entertaining impressions of a thoughtful 
writer whose observations may be regarded as absolutely trust- 
worthy representations. The chapter on Siberia is particularly 
timely. There is a very spirited description of the wonderful 
railroad that connects in one grand, continuous line Moscow in 
the frozen north with Port Arthur on the Yellow Sea — the first 
great enterprise of the twentieth century. Prison life in this 
forlorn land of perpetual exile is described with fascinating 
vividness. China and Japan are brought before us; and his 
observations on race characteristics are of surpassing interest 
and value. 

The one hundred illustrations are peculiarly instructive, and 
add greatly to the value of an exceedingly interesting book. It 
is a large 12mo admirably printed on excellent paper and bound 
in handsome silk cloth. It is a strikingly beautiful and attrac- 
tive book, inside and outside, and should find its way to every 
book-shelf. — Literary News, 



OUR NATIONAL 
RECREATION PARKS 



Our National 
Recreation Parks 



BY 

NICHOLAS SENN, M. D.. Ph. D./ LL. D. 

Professor of Surgery in Rush Medical College, in 
Affiliation with the University of Chicago; Surgeon- 
in-Chief St. Joseph's Hospital; Attending Surgeon 
Presbyterian Hospital; Lieutenant-Colonel and Chief 
of the Operating Staff with the Army in the Fi-eld 
during the Spanish-Ajne.Mcan War; Surgi^on rQe,nr^ 
eral of Illinois. >->.,, 



=^3=- 



WITH FIFTY ILLUSTRATIONS 



CHICAGO 

W. B. CONKEY COMPANY 
1904 






^ 



LIBRARY of CONGRESS 

Two Copies Received 

MAY 12 1904 

Ceoyrlirht Entry 

CLASS «- XXo. No. 

COPY B ' 



Copyright. 1904. 
^[y tv. B. Cof^I^ey 'company 



PREFACE 



This little book conveys the impressions made 
upon me during a visit to our great national recrea- 
tion parks — the Yellowstone and Yosemite Valley — 
during my recent summer vacation. An inspection of 
these wonderlands can not fail in leaving lasting 
impressions of their manifold indescribable beauties, 
exquisite illustrations of natural art and exhaustless 
resources of nature's ceaseless activities. The many 
enchanting sceneries defy description, and accounts of 
the hundreds of mysterious geysers and the Grand 
Canyon of the Yellowstone and the big trees of the 
Sierras, sound like fairy tales. No visitor who has 
ever seen these natural parks has ever been disap- 
pointed in his expectations. The alpine and subalpine 
regions, with their great primeval forests, bewitching 
lakes, the numerous mountain springs and rivers teem- 
ing with choicest fish, the charming flora and varied 
fauna, furnish object-lessons from the book of nature 
which attract the eye and engage the mind from sun- 
rise to sunset, and the cool nights and pure mountain 
air will bring back sleep if it has been chased away by 



H-I^WO 



PREFACE 

an exacting, arduous, artificial city life. Nowhere in 
the world can a vacation of a few weeks be spent more 
pleasantly and profitably than by a visit to these parks 
which have been set aside by a generous and far- 
sighted government as recreation grounds for the 
benefit of the people. To those who would like to 
see the most beautiful sceneries and nature's grandest 
products and exhibitions of art, I would unhesitatingly 
say: "Come and see." 

Chicago^ Christmas^ igoj. 




AMONG THE BIG TREES, MARIPOSA GROVE. 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 



Yosemite Valley from Artist's Point Frontispiece 

Among the Big Trees, Mariposa Grove Facing Page 10 

Overhanging Rock at Glacier Point " " 12 • 

Sentinel Rock " " 16 

President Roosevelt in Yellowstone Park " " 18 

Herd of Mountain Sheep " " 20 ' 

Riverside Geyser " " 26 

Emerald Spring , " " 28 

Giant Geyser " " 30 

Old Faithful at Sunrise " " 32 / 

Gibbon Falls " " 38 

Obsidian Cliff " " 40 

Gardiner Canyon *' " 42 

Golden Gate '* *' 44 

Bear Boarders " ' * 48 

Canyon of the Yellowstone " " 50 ' 

Upper Falls of the Yellowstone " * * 52 

Point Inspiration and Lower Falls " " 54 

Lower Falls of the Yellowstone " " 56 -' 

Steamer Zillah on Yellowstone Lake ** ** 64" 

Yellowstone Park in Midwinter " " 68 

Pines near the Chapel " " 70 ' 

Herd of Buffalo near Fort Yellowstone " '* 72 

Elks— Hay den Valley in Winter '* *' 74 

On the Lookout '* ** 76 

Elk near Yellowstone Lake * ' * ' 78 

11 



12 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 



Looking for a New Home Facing Page 82 

Grouse Hunting Party in View of Teton Moun- 
tains 

The "Tetons" from Jackson Lake 

A Storm in the Yosemite 

Majella, an Old Indian Woman, in Search of 
Acorns , 

Half Dome 

Yosemite Valley after a Snow-storm 

Washington Column and Mirror Lake 

Wind Playing with Bridal Veil Falls (900 feet). . . 

El Capitan 

The Hutchings' Cabin, Yosemite Valley 

Stairway on Cloud's Rest Trail 

Agassiz Column (85 feet) 

Upper Yosemite Falls (1,600 feet) and Ice Cone 
(500 feet) 

Yosemite Falls 

Washington Column (1,800 feet) and Half Dome 
(5,000 feet) 

Vernal Fall (350 feet) 

In the Mariposa Big Tree Grove, from the 
Wawona 

The Grizzly Giant, Mariposa Grove 

Wawona with the Stage, Mariposa Grove 

Fallen Monarch, Mariposa Grove 

Foundation of the Grizzly Giant 



100 
102 
104 
106 
108 
110 
112 
114 

116 
118 

120 
124 

126 
134 
136 
144 
146 




OVERHANGING ROCK AT GLACIER POINT. 



INTRODUCTION 



The man who toils with his brain in the bank, the 
pulpit, the court room, the library, the great mercan- 
tile establishments, and last, but not least, at the bed- 
side of the sick or in the operating room, is the one 
above all others in need of an occasional rest, change 
of mental activity and surroundings. Men who ignore 
nature's warnings and appeals for rest, sooner or later 
are made to pay dearly for their neglect, and only too 
often mend their ways when it is too late. Brain toil 
means the prolonged strenuous application of the 
neurons which preside over functions required in the 
discharge of professional duties or business transac- 
tions. If these functions are overtaxed, brain fatigue 
Js the result. This brain fatigue involves that part of 
the brain which has been overtaxed, while the remain- 
ing neurons are suffering from the consequences of idle- 
ness. Indigestion, insomnia and a morose temper are 
the earliest and surest indications of brain exhaustion, 
and when they do appear must be heeded by the 
sufferer, who then should seek the necessary relief by 
appropriate rest and change of surroundings. Loss 
of sleep is responsible for much of the unhappiness in 
this world and innumerable acts of desperation. Sleep 
is the brain's staunchest ally, and when it hides itself, 
the delicate machinery will soon rebel against the 
most indomitable will. Insomnia is the brain toiler's 
worst enemy. 

13 



14 INTRODUCTION 

"O sleep, O gentle sleep, 
Nature's soft nurse! how have I frightened thee, 
That thou no more wilt weigh my eyelids down 
And steep my senses in forgetfulness?" 

— Shakespeare. 

If the sufferer from insomnia begins battle with his 
enemy by substituting artificially induced sleep for 
natural sleep, his downfall will be speedy and certain. 
The average physician, when consulted by the sleepless 
sufferers, gives the well-meant advice to cease work 
and seek rest. This advice, even when promptly 
accepted and carried into effect, is often void of the 
expected results, for 

"Powerful indeed is the empire of habit." 

— Publius Syr us. 

What is rest for some is toil to others. Idleness is 
not rest. The needed rest is rest for the overburdened 
neurons and useful employment for the neurons which 
have been at a standstill. The fashionable summer 
resorts, crowded, noisy cities, long wearisome journeys 
and luxurious clubs are not congenial to the sufferer 
from brain fatigue. 

"Indolence, that dangerous siren, must be 
eschewed, or thou must be content to yield up 
whatever thou hast acquired by the nobler 
exertions of thy life." — Horatius. 

Labor is man's mission on earth, and when the 
monotony of one kind of strenuous exertion creates 
fatigue, a change of work and surroundings brings the 
much desired repose. The artisan and farmer, when 
affected by muscle fatigue, will find the busy city inter- 
esting, instructive and restful; the brain toiler should 
seek rest and relief in nature's work shops and art 



INTRODUCTION 15 

galleries, where there are no telephones, no tele- 
graphs, no daily news, and where the screech of the 
steam whistle and the hum of manufactories have no 
access. The trees, the shrubs, the flowers and the 
birds are the best friends of the weary, fretful soul. 

The most successful physician is he who finds and 
removes the cause of disease. In no other disease is 
this more important than in brain tire. The most fre- 
quent cause of brain fatigue is care, a fact recognized 
by the poet of all poets when he said: 

"I am sure care's an enemy to life." 

— Shakespeare, 

For the intelligent mind there is no loneliness 
in solitude. Nature's handiwork is everywhere. It 
is seen in the desert, on the prairies, in the forests, 
the rivers, the lakes and the countless forms of animal 
and vegetable life. 

Man is never alone. During the day busy nature 
is the entertainer, and at night the ever-varying sky is 
the silent instructor. 

The seeker for mental repose away from all care 
in the midst of solitude will become conscious of the 
fact that 

"He is never less at leisure than when at leisure." 

— Cicero. 

And 

"In solitude, where we are at least alone." 

— Byron. 

There is no country in the world that has as many 
imprudent brain workers as the United States. The 
unbridled ambition for fame, influence and wealth 
leads to a strenuous life which has shortened the lives 
and curtailed the usefulness of thousands of our best 



16 INTR OD UC TION 

professional and business men annually, and there are 
no indications pointing to an abatement of the intense 
struggle for supremacy in all walks of life. Fortu- 
nately, there is no country that can equal our own in 
the number and attractiveness of places of genuine 
recreation for those who are in search of mental 
repose. We can boast of an expanse of seashore, 
countless placid lakes, endless prairies, numerous fas- 
cinating rivers, great primitive forests, snow-clad 
mountains, Niagara Falls and the Yellowstone and 
Yosemite National Parks. We have the best means 
of rapid transit by which the most remote parts of the 
country can be reached with ease and comfort in a 
few days. We have a variety in climate that takes 
away every possible excuse for tourists to cross the 
ocean on either side when in search for rest and recre- 
ation. Let me urge upon all those in need of mental 
rest to abstain from the worry and care of travel to 
foreign countries and select one from the hundreds of 
the most attractive places within the limits of our own 
country in which to spend their much-needed and well- 
earned vacation. Plain food, plenty of outdoor physical 
exercise and congenial mental occupation will accom- 
plish more than medicines in resting the brain and in 
restoring its functions to normal. The dry, cool, 
bracing air of a high altitude is particularly well 
adapted in the treatment of functional nervous disor- 
ders. One of the most desirable places for this class 
of patients is unquestionably the Yellowstone Park. 
No valley within its limits has an elevation of less 
than 6,000 feet, while many of the mountain peaks 
within and adjacent to the Park rise from 10,000 to 
14,000 feet above the level of the sea. 




SENTINEL ROCK. 



HISTORT AND LOCATION 

OF 

TELLOWSTONE PARK 



In 1872 the government took the necessary steps 
to establish a national park in the most romantic part 
of the Rocky Mountains — the northwestern corner of 
Wyoming, the Switzerland of the United States. Its 
boundaries overlap a few miles into Montana on the 
north and Idaho and Montana on the west. The 
original reservation is sixty-five miles east and west 
and seventy-five miles north and south. By an act of 
Congress, the 3,344 square miles which it embraces 
were set aside ''and dedicated as a public park, or 
pleasure ground, for the benefit and enjoyment of the 
people." It is in every sense of the word a public 
pleasure ground. It has recently been enlarged by 
thousands of square miles by an act of Congress pro- 
viding for a timber reserve. It is one of nature's 
masterpieces. Its alpine scenery is superb; its lakes 
and rivers of the purest water teem with choicest fish; 
its meadows and dark, primitive forests are decorated 
with countless varieties of flowers; it is the home of 
the noblest game, and its spouting, mysterious geysers 
lend an attraction found on no other continent. The 
most industrious student can spend a whole season in 
this wonderland, and then leave it with a keen sense of 

2 17 



18 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

having seen only a few of its most important attrac- 
tions. 

ENTRANCE TO THE PARK FROM THE WEST, 

Yellowstone Park is accessible from two sides—' 
from Cinnabar on the north and Monida on the west. 
I visited the Park during my summer vacation in 1903, 
and selected the western entrance from Monida, mak- 
ing the trip in a direction opposite to the great stream 
of visitors. Monida is on the Oregon Short Line. It 
is the headquarters of the Monida and Yellowstone 
Stage Company. The Summit House is an excellent 
little hotel, where the traveler can spend a restful 
night. The stages, private carriages, horses and 
drivers leave nothing to be desired. The routine stage 
journey from here through the Park is made in seven 
days, for which a charge of twenty-eight dollars is 
made. As it was my intention to study the beauties 
of the Park thoroughly and travel leisurely, I made the 
trip in a private conveyance, accompanied by Dr. 
Salomon, of Coblenz, Germany, and his wife. 

FROM MONIDA TO THE PARK. 

We started Tuesday morning, July 7th, and arrived 
at Red Rocks, the first station, a distance of thirty 
miles, at four o'clock in the afternoon. Overcoats 
and blankets were necessary to protect ourselves 
against the chilly wind from the west. The distance 
from Monida to the boundary of the Park is seventy 
miles. The road is in excellent condition and for the 
most part level; the highest hill over which we passed 
had an elevation of less than 200 feet. The Monida 
route threads the foothills of the Rocky Mountains, 



FROM MONIDA TO THE PARK 19 

skirting the lovely Centennial Valley, the Red Rocks 
Lakes, and after passing through the flowery meadows 
of Alaska Basin, crosses the Divide to Henry Lake 
in Idaho, whence it recrosses the range into Mon- 
tana via Turghe Pass, near the western entrance to 
the Park. Fertile pasture lands, snow-clad moun- 
tains on both sides, crystal mountain streams and 
smooth, silvery mountain lakes charm the eye along 
the entire route. The scenery on the entire trip to 
the Park is as beautiful and captivating as the Park 
itself. It is a mistake to make the journey in one day. 
The little hamlet Red Rocks has a charming location, 
as the scenery around it is superb. The hotel is a 
one-story log house with a frame addition. We were 
privileged to occupy a separate cozy log house villa. 
A general store, saloon and a few log cabins make up 
the balance of the hamlet. Graylings at least ten 
inches in length were served for lunch and supper, and 
were greatly enjoyed by all. This fish and speckled 
trout are found in abundance in the mountain streams 
and Red Rocks and Henry Lakes. Epicures differ as 
to the merits of these two kinds of fish; we, certainly 
had no fault to find with our grayling. From an emi- 
nence west of the hamlet a view is obtained which 
defies pen and brush to do it justice. The quiet, 
peaceful, diminutive hamlet below, with a high liberty 
pole in its center, the top graced by the stars and 
stripes floating in the evening breeze; in front of it a 
mountain stream hedged in by blossoming willows; 
behind it high mountain peaks covered here and there 
by blankets of snow; to the left the Red Rocks Lakes 
in the distance, and the Sheep Mountain, famous for 
a small herd of bighorns that so far have escaped the 



20 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

onslaught of the most intrepid hunters and are fre- 
quently seen by the aid of glasses; to the right Bear 
Mountain, the home of the grizzly, silvertip, cinna- 
mon and black bear; the whole panorama resplendent 
in the soft rays of the retiring sun. 

TWO FAMILIES OF PRAIRIE CHICKENS. 

On our way from Monida to Red Rocks we had an 
opportunity to make a practical study of maternal 
love and devotion. Within twenty feet of our carriage 
we surprised two prairie chickens with their offspring. 
Both mothers manifested intense anxiety for their ten 
to twelve little ones, who but a few days before had 
first seen the sage brush in which they had left the 
narrow limits of their shell. The little chicks, uncon- 
scious of danger, playfully scampered around their 
frightened mothers. The mothers refused to make 
use of their wings and seek safety in flight. They 
urged the little ones by all kinds of movements and sug- 
gestions to make the best use of their tiny legs in the 
direction away from their enemies. The retreat was 
slow, but orderly. We looked in vain for the fathers 
of the little babes; they scented danger in time and 
were out of sight when we rudely disturbed the morn- 
ing reunion. This observation showed us as plainly 
as could be demonstrated by action the pre-eminence 
of maternal over paternal love and devotion. Another 
little animal that entertained us at short intervals 
during the entire day was the small variety of ground 
squirrel. Like the larger variety so common in Cali- 
fornia, it lives under ground. The head is that of a 
squirrel; the tail is long, but not bushy. It is said 
they are a cross between the real ground squirrel and 



TWO FAMILIES OF PRAIRIE CHICKENS 21 

the mountain rat. They are sociable creatures and 
live in colonies. When alarmed, they hasten to the 
open door of their subterranean home, squat on their 
haunches, tail on the ground, body erect, arms against 
the chest and forearms slightly flexed, remaining in this 
attitude statuette-like, perhaps elongating or short- 
ening the body for half an inch or an inch in jerks as 
they take in the surroundings; then again remaining 
motionless until, when they believe the dangerous 
moment has come, they plunge head forward into 
the hole with the speed of lightning. 

The following day we left for Dwelle, forty miles 
distant, where we arrived in time for supper. This 
part of the journey is replete with pleasant surprises. 
The lofty snow-clad mountains are constantly in view, 
for the most part timbered to near the barren peaks; 
the mountain streams and rivulets are crossed at short 
intervals, and the excellent road skirts the Red Rocks 
and Henry Lakes; the rich meadows in the valleys, 
passes and gorges are veritable botanical gardens. 
The abundance and beauty of the subalpine flora 
reminded us of: 

"And because the breath of flowers is far 
sweeter in the air (where it comes and goes like 
the working of music) than in the hand, there- 
fore nothing is more fit for that delight than to 
know what be the flowers and plants that do 
best perfume the air." — Bacon. 

The day was perfect. In the morning we saw thin 
pellicles of ice on little pools near the hotel, but with 
the rising sun the chill in the air disappeared and all 
kinds of insects, including mosquitoes, left their hid- 
ing-places and enjoyed the warm sunshine, bent upon 



22 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

enjoyment and search for food. The cloudless sky 
and the enchanting sceneries made this part of our 
journey restful and delightful. On the larger of the 
two Red Rocks Lakes we counted nine swans and a 
number of small flocks of ducks. 

AN INQUISITIVE INHABITANT OF THE PRAIRIE. 

A short distance from Lake View Hotel I discov- 
ered a moving mass in the high sage brush on the 
right side of the road which disappeared very suddenly. 
It was not a bird, and from the size and color of the 
disappearing body, I concluded it must have been a 
badger. Upon this supposition the carriage was 
brought to a standstill and a thirty-thirty rifle made in 
readiness. I looked intently in the direction where 
the mass disappeared, and after a short pause I recog- 
nized a sharp nose with black vertical stripes make its 
appearance in a large hole with a diminutive embank- 
ment behind. Very soon a pair of eyes and two short 
ears came in sight. The animal was evidently watch- 
ing us as carefully as we were him. He did not think 
it prudent to advance any farther. I fired, and judg- 
ing from the fur that flew, I was confident that the 
bullet had been sent in the right direction. We 
stepped up to the hole and found the dead badger 
barely within sight and reach. The bullet had done 
its deadly work by carrying away the right half of the 
lower jaw and by traversing the base of the neck. My 
companion took charge of the skin and will have an 
American badger in his collection on his return to 
Europe. 



TWO CRANES TAKEN BY SURPRISE 23 

TWO SANDHILL CRANES TAKEN BY SURPRISE. 

Between the Red Rocks Lakes and Henry Lake we 
discovered two immense birds in a ravine below a 
bank of snow and near the edge of the pine forest. 
They stalked about majestically and in a very bungling 
manner jumped across a ditch, slowly wending their 
way in the direction of the near cover. The hunting 
spirit of my friend was suddenly awakened, and 
although the birds were at least 150 yards away, he 
grasped his rifle, took deliberate aim and fired. With 
the report of the gun the birds rose, and with a pene- 
trating gr-gr-gr began their flight across the valley. 
Another bullet was sent after them, which had the 
effect of still more increasing the speed of their enor- 
mous wings. Sandhill cranes are not seen often in 
this section of the country, and it was a pleasant 
experience for my companion to see and shoot at these 
strangers of the alpine mesa. 

Lake Henry is a beautiful sheet of water and the 
source of the Snake River. It is a favorite place for 
fishermen in pursuit of speckled trout and grayling. 
Snake River, near its origin where it is crossed by the 
road, is at least fifteen yards wide and on an average 
three feet in depth. The excellent pasturage all along 
has attracted many cattlemen who live in small log 
houses always on the bank of a mountain stream. 
After crossing Snake River, the road enters Turghe 
Pass. At the entrance of the Pass the road leads 
through an immense dense grove of poplars, the light 
green trembling foliage of which furnished a strong 
contrast with the dark green background of pines. 
From here to Dwelle the valley is narrow and vegeta- 



24 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

tion more scanty. Dwelle has a large log hotel with 
a new annex of similar construction, and in case 
of necessity tent accommodations. The rooms are 
comfortable and the kitchen satisfactory and freely 
supplied with grayling and trout from Henry Lake and 
the south branch of Madison River. In the general 
store the traveler will find everything he will need for 
a trip through the Park. In the hotel is a collection 
of prepared skins and mounted specimens of nearly all 
game animals of the Rocky Mountains. A feature of 
this collection is a number of superb elk heads. 
Dwelle is six miles from the western boundary of the 
Park. We changed horses, carriage and driver at this 
station, and next day left for the Park. The road 
passes through a dense forest of pine until the 
bridge that spans Madison River is reached. In 
crossing the bridge we encountered a number of 
ground-hogs who appeared to be on the most inti- 
mate and best terms with the tourists, so much so 
that we succeeded in photographing some of them 
at a range of less than ten feet. When pressed too 
close they would unwillingly crawl into their hid- 
ing-place among the loose stones underneath the 
bridge. We made the journey from Dwelle to the 
Fountain Hotel, a distance of twenty-eight miles, in 
less than five hours. The road follows the Madison 
River from the bridge to where it is formed by the 
junction of the Firehole and Gibbon Rivers, when it 
passes through Christmas Park, so called from the 
arrangement and beauty of pine trees on both sides of 
it. The Fountain Hotel is a large frame structure 
painted yellow, in full view of the geysers of the upper 
geyser basin. Although built seven years ago, it is a 



BEAR HOTEL GUESTS 25 

modern structure with all conveniences found in the 
hotels of large cities. A company of cavalry is sta- 
tioned a few miles north of the hotel, and we found 
the soldiers busily engaged in the construction of a 
new telegraph line, while some of the officers were 
wading the river and exercising their muscles in cast- 
ing for trout. 

BEAR HOTEL GUESTS. 

In the evening we joined the remaining guests of 
the hotel on their way to a place about 200 yards 
behind the hotel, the feeding ground for bears. The 
food is deposited on a little knoll guarded in front by 
a single v/ire fastened to trees. On a board nailed to 
one of the trees was printed in large type the warn- 
ing: "Keep Out — Danger." We were not kept long 
in suspense. A one-year-old black bear came out of 
the woods noiselessly and cautiously, found the 
expected morsel in the shape of a large soup bone, 
seized it with his mouth and slowly walked from the 
open place into a clump of trees where, in full view of 
the audience, he satisfied his sense of hunger. Very 
soon he was joined by a larger companion, and for 
reasons we could not comprehend at the time, both of 
them climbed the same tree, the smaller one in the 
lead. These bears were shot at repeatedly, not with 
guns, but with a number of kodaks. The reason for 
the climbing of these bears became evident when an 
immense cinnamon bear took possession of the food 
supply. This bear is well known to the residents of 
the hotel, who informed us that when he comes all of 
the little bears are expected to retire. The cinnamon 
bear took his time in consuming his evening meal, and 



26 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

no amount of whistling or loud talking could disturb 
the equilibrium of his well-balanced instinct. When 
darkness set in, the little bears in the tree were still 
watching the giant of the bear camp disposing of the 
rations so liberally furnished by the hotel. This cin- 
namon bear is the one that figures so conspicuously in 
the collection of photographic illustrations of the bear 
tribe of the Park. He is seldom absent at supper 
time, and his arrival is a strong hint for the smaller 
bears to clear the field. When he has finished his 
meal the subordinates are welcome to what is left. 
The big bear is not vicious, but extremely selfish and 
intolerant. It is to his advantage that the grizzly is 
no competitor for the free food supply. With all his 
shortcomings as far as the nobler virtues are con- 
cerned, he is always a welcome visitor, and during the. 
open season he is sure of an appreciative audience. 
He appears to know that the visitors are not only 
anxious to see him, but equally anxious to carry his 
shadow home with them in the camera, as he conde- 
scends to pose in all possible bear positions, to the 
great delight of the amateur kodakists. 

THE GEYSERS. 

The greatest wonder of the Yellowstone Park is 
the Geyser Valley. The other attractions of the Park 
can be found elsewhere on an equal and some of them 
on a superior scale, but to see a geyser in this country 
we must visit the Yellowstone Park. A geyser is a 
spouting hot spring. Hot springs are numerous and 
are found in most countries, but geysers only exist in 
Iceland, New Zealand and the Yellowstone Park. The 
geyser with which every child who has studied geog- 



THE GEYSERS 27 

raphy is most familiar is the one near Hankadale, Ice- 
land. The hot wells and geyser here were due to the 
volcanic eruption of 1294, when the old hot springs 
disappeared and those now in existence came. Ice- 
land's great geyser spouts very irregularly, sometimes 
a very large volume of water to a height of 100 feet. 
The only other geysers are on the North Island, New 
Zealand. Napa Valley has boiling springs improperly 
called geysers. Geyser action remains a puzzle to the 
scientific men. Many theories have been advanced. 
The theory entertained by Bunsen is the one most 
generally accepted. According to Bunsen, the ejec- 
tion of the water is caused by explosive action due to 
the heating of the water under pressure in the lower 
part of the geyser-tube to considerably above the boil- 
ing point. The elastic force of the heated water over- 
comes the weight of the superincumbent water, and 
the relief from pressure is so great during the ascent 
of the column of water that steam is generated rapidly 
and to such an amount as to eject with great force 
from the tube a great quantity of the water. The 
water thrown up by the geysers contains silica, which 
when deposited around the margins of the craters con- 
stitutes what is known as geyserite. It occurs as 
white or grayish, porous, in stalactitic, filamentous, 
honeycomb or cauliflower-like forms. The geyserite 
stones are stratiform, very hard, the layers varying 
greatly in thickness. The stones exempt from fur- 
ther geyserite formation crumble on the surface when 
the disintegrating stone is transformed into small 
chips and sand-like debris. All of the orifices of gey- 
sers have everted or undermined margins of this flint- 
like geyserite, which by increase of the deposits grow 



28 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

into cones variable in shape, sometimes resembling a 
cup, a bowl, or even a castle, varying in height from a 
few inches to twenty feet (Castle geyser). 

THE YELLOWSTONE GEYSERS. 

The Yellowstone ge3^sers are noted for their num- 
ber and variety. The place to study geyser action is 
in the Firehole Basin. To the tourists who, like our- 
selves, have seen these first, the fearful geysers of the 
Norris Basin have lost much of their terror. The 
Firehole Basin is divided into lower, middle and 
upper, all of which have geysers of established reputa- 
tion. These basins occupy a valley of varying width 
extending from north to south, bisected by the Fire- 
hole River and walled in by mountains covered with a 
dense pine forest from base to summit. The valley is 
eight miles in length, and with the exception of short 
intervals, clouds of steam are never out of sight, and 
the gurgling, hissing and blowing of the geysers, large 
and small, almost constantly engage the ear. The 
basins present a desert-like appearance, the so-called 
formations made up of- the silica precipitations, the 
geyserite in solid stone or the crumbled debris of the 
surface of the underlying stones. All of the basins 
appear like underground cities with smoking chimneys 
reaching to or projecting from the surface. In fact, 
the whole valley is one immense subterranean caldron 
with vents in the form of fissures and craters varying 
from a mere chink to great clefts and from a circular 
opening the size of a thimble to craters thirty feet in 
diameter. These geysers undoubtedly have a common 
volcanic heat supply and communicate with each 
other by a complicated network of subterranean pas- 



THE YELLOWSTONE GEYSERS 29 

sages. All of the active geysers contain and eject 
water heated to the boiling point. Geysers appear 
and disappear. Some of the largest geysers which 
were active less than twenty years ago are now only 
hot wells, and some of the geysers have been born and 
have won fame since that time. The steam, the col- 
umns of hot water of the spouting geysers and the 
bubbling, gurgling, hissing, blowing noises impart to 
these basins an awe-inspiring aspect. In contempla- 
ting these mysterious spectacles of the strange under- 
ground furnace, the words of Milton occur to the 
visitor: 

"For hot, cold, moist, and dry, 

Four champions fierce 

Strive here for mast'ry." 

No wonder the savage Indians avoided the Firehole 
Valley. They called it the spirit land. None of the 
numerous Indian trails near it lead into it. They 
looked upon these underground smoking cities from a 
safe distance. The craters have been shaped into 
strange forms. Some are artistic, others grotesque. 
All of the principal geysers have a signboard upon 
which is printed their name in large letters so that the 
signs can be read at a distance. These names are 
descriptive of the form of the crater, the colors 
reflected by the water in the hot well, or the manner 
of action during the explosion. The following are a 
few of the most familiar names: Giant, Lion, Castle, 
Constant, Grand, Prismatic, Beehive, Sponge, But- 
terfly, Sawmill, Faithful, Turquoise, Fan, Morning 
Glory, Surprise, Fountain, Mortar, Oyster, Boiler, 
Black Growler, Minute Man, Skyrocket and Grotto. 
The largest geyser in the world seventeen years 



30 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

ago was the Excelsior in the Middle Basin. At 
that time it spouted regularly every two hours six 
months out of the year, and sent the boiling water 300 
feet into the air. To-day it is simply a hot well. 
There are a dozen or more craters on Mount Schurz, 
a mountain 2,000 feet above the level of the living 
geysers. They have lost their geyser action and emit 
only a feeble column of steam. The number of dead 
geysers and hot wells which formerly were great gey- 
sers is very large, probably outnumbering the active 
geysers. This is more especially the case in the 
Norris Basin. Three years ago there was a large gey- 
ser in a deep gorge of the east bank of the valley. 
This geyser is now extinct, and a few yards above it 
the two most terrible geysers of this basin have formed, 
the Boiler and the Black Growler, The Boiler is the 
most terrifying of all the unearthly underground cal- 
drons in the Park. When it first made its appearance, 
the steam escaped with such force that the roar it cre- 
ated could be heard at a distance of a mile. It has 
never spouted water. The steam which escapes now 
from two orifices is ejected with such force and such a 
large volume as to frighten the most intrepid when 
standing near the awful chasm. Less than 100 feet 
above it is the Black Growler, one of the two geysers 
which have taken the place of the one that disap- 
peared three years ago. From a number of small 
craters in a line representing an immense fissure steam 
is ejected with tremendous force, and the hot water is 
thrown a distance of only a few feet in intermittent 
jets. 

For several years there existed near the Congress 
geyser in the Norris Basin, the "Steam Vent," one of 



THE YELLOWSTONE GEYSERS 31 

the features of this basin. It consisted merely of an 
opening in the rocks from which a great quantity of 
steam was constantly escaping; the roaring of the 
same could be heard for miles. During the winter of 
1893 the "Steam Vent" and the Congress appeared. 
The first eruptions were of great force and completely 
blockaded the road with masses of earth and geyser 
formation. The water of all of the geysers has a 
strong odor of sulphur, but the quantity of sulphur 
varies; its presence accounts for the turbidity of a few 
of the hot pools, and one of the geysers of the Norris 
Basin is noted for the amount of sulphur mixed with 
the boiling water and deposited on the margins of the 
long, narrow fissure-like crater. The Norris Basin is 
known for the number of small craters; many of them 
but thinly crusted are insufficient to support a per- 
son's weight, and for the safety of the visitors planks 
have been laid over the most dangerous part of the 
valley. The visitor experiences a greater sense of 
danger in walking over the smooth, steaming, boiling 
surface of the Norris Basin than the geyser basins of 
Firehole River Valley. The Constant geyser is a 
punctual and instructive entertainer. Every minute 
he sends from the center of the round basin a jet of 
steam and boiling water to a height of forty feet, 
while the column of water seldom exceeds ten feet. 
With each act he demonstrates to the astounded, 
admiring visitor geyser action. He is not vain, but 
in a modest manner exhibits his virtues — punctu- 
ality, perseverance and, as his name indicates, con- 
stancy. Many of the geysers in the Firehole River 
Valley pour the boiling water directly into the river, 



32 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

but this admixture has had no destructive effect on the 
inhabitants of the cold mountain stream. 

A GEYSER IN ACTION. 

Geyser action is variable, as it depends largely on 
the size and construction of the crater tube and the 
steam pressure which lifts the water above the surface 
of the crater. The elevation to which the water is 
projected varies from an inch to lOO or more feet. 
The innumerable baby geysers with an opening not 
larger than a thimble spout diligently, but seldom 
succeed in throwing the water more than a few inches 
above the diminutive crater. The most famous gey- 
sers, such as the Faithful, Castle, Giant and Grand, 
at the present time, on an average force their boiling 
contents to a height of lOO feet. Some of the geysers, 
like the Old Faithful and Minute Man, have gained a 
well-merited reputation for their punctuality. The 
Old Faithful requires sixty-five minutes to gather 
sufficient strength to accomplish his set task, while the 
Minute Man goes through with sixty-five smaller per- 
formances during the same space of time and with the 
same degree of punctuality. Some geysers, like the 
Giant, have become unpopular for their unreliability. 
The Giant takes from five to ten days' rest between 
his giant acts. The Surprise will spout when least 
expected. To see a large geyser in action is to wit- 
ness one of nature's grandest acts. I will attempt to 
describe one of Old Faithful's displays. The opening 
of the crater of this geyser is two feet wide and four 
feet in length. The crater occupies the summit of a 
mound about ten feet in height, made of ge3^serite, an 
indication of its great age. Seated on a bench upon 



9 

4 



A GEYSER IN ACTION 33 

the summit of an extinct geyser of the same height 
and within twenty yards of Old Faithful, I was one of 
many visitors prepared to witness the next act. From 
the crater a large volume of steam escapes constantly, 
which, when the wind is not in its way, rises to a 
height of at least lOO feet. When at rest the crater 
contains no water. The first indication of the gather- 
ing of the subterranean . force is the increase in the 
volume and force of the escaping steam with a corre- 
sponding accentuation in the hissing and blowing noise 
which attends this preliminary act. The next phe- 
nomena include filling of the basin above the crater 
with seething, boiling water, followed by a few feeble 
explosions which throw numerous jets of water several 
feet into the air. These jets rise and fall a number of 
times, when all of a sudden with a loud, thud-like 
noise, a column of water is shot up into the air to a 
height of lOO feet or more. The act has now com- 
menced in earnest. After this solid column of boiling 
water has been thrown up to its maximum height like 
a rocket, its descent is contested by a few additional 
explosions of the same force, and the struggle between 
the rising and descending water begins. The fierce 
contest between the steam and gravitation forces is 
seen in the air. The descending water yields to the 
explosive force and falls in a spray over and around 
the ascending column of hissing, boihng water. The 
large drops of falling water in the intense light of the 
sun appear like a shower of diamonds. The column 
becomes lower and lower and v/ider and wider, and 
the audience has come to the conclusion that the act 
is over. Not so the Old Faithful. In a last and 
desperate effort he shoots up another column to a 
a 



34 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

height of perhaps fifty feet. The strength now leaves 
him and all he can do for another minute or two 
is to hold the seething mass four to six feet above the 
rim of the basin, when a sudden collapse sets in and 
the water retreats over the crater and much of 
it falls to its underground vat to be reheated and 
utilized in the next act, while the overflow forms 
rivulets of hot water which soon empty into the nearby 
Firehole River. The whole performance is finished in 
from four to five minutes. We studied geyser action 
for three days in the Firehole Valley and Norris Basin, 
and left the latter for Mammoth Springs Sunday, July 
1 2th, greatly pleased with what we had seen and 
learned. The road from the Fountain Hotel to Norris 
Basin passes through a primitive pine forest and fol- 
lows for the most part the Firehole and Gibbon Rivers. 
A large force of men is employed in improving the 
road, which is now in an excellent condition. On our 
way we met twelve stage coaches and a number of 
private carriages going in an opposite direction, every 
seat occupied, showing that the busy season had com- 
menced. A new and large hotel is now in process of 
construction at the Upper Basin, which will be com- 
pleted with the opening of next season. At present 
the hotel proper consists of an office, a dining-room 
and kitchen. The patrons live in tents supplied with 
stoves and comfortable beds. Norris Basin is a lunch 
station, but a small hotel can accommodate all the 
guests who desire to spend more time in visiting the 
interesting geysers and formation of this basin. As 
the distance from the Fountain Hotel to Mammoth 
Springs is forty miles, it is advisable for tourists who 
travel leisurely to spend one night at Norris Basin, 
half-way between the two large hotels. 



THE GEYSERS AS ARTISTS 35 

The road from the Fountain Hotel to Norris Basin 
follows the Firehole River and later the Gibbon canyon 
and river of the same name. Gibbon Falls, although 
only twenty feet in height, is an interesting sight 
viewed from the roadbed above it cut out of the solid 
rock. The moment the visitor arrives at Norris Basin 
until he leaves it, he breathes air strongly impregnated 
with sulphurous gases. 

THE GEYSERS AS ARTISTS. 

"Nature is the art of God." 

— Br ozone. 

The geysers are not only the ver}^ personification 
of a mysterious, awe-inspiring, hidden power, but 
when at rest they assume the function of an artist. 
They paint in colors human art and skill cannot repro- 
duce. How artists must envy their skill! Some of 
these boiling hot wells produce a paint which the 
coarse human hand can use in beautifying the rough 
building material. The Mammoth Paint Pots in the 
Lower Basin of the Firehole River Valley manufac- 
ture a white paint that has been used in painting the 
interior of the adjacent Fountain Hotel. This manu- 
facturer of paint is one of the most remarkable fea- 
tures of that part of the geyser region. This strange 
mud caldron has a basin which measures forty by sixty 
feet, with a mud rim on three sides, which is from four 
to five feet in height. In this basin is a bubbling 
white mass of the consistency of cream in a state of 
constant agitation. This remarkable mud well has 
been in action as long as it has been known and has 
undergone but little change. The constant boiling 



36 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

has reduced the contents to a thoroughly mixed mass 
of siHcious clay which mixes readily with turpentine, 
and when thus mixed constitutes an excellent white 
paint. On the north side of the mud basin the rim is 
low and forms the edge of a flat of pink and red, which 
is cracked and seamed, and over which are scattered 
thirty or forty solid mud cones of a pinkish color, 
some two to three feet in height. The seething, bub- 
bling, dull white mass is the same now as when this 
mysterious associate of the many neighboring geysers 
was first discovered. The hot wells, resting geysers, 
contain cr^'^stal water remarkable for its transparency. 
The reflection of the rays of the sun and pigmented de- 
posits give rise to a blending of colors such as never has 
been seen on canvas. It is the delicacy of coloration 
and the almost imperceptible blending of the tints 
that characterize the touch of the invisible brush of 
the geyser artist. Some of these hot wells represent 
in color the purest gems, like the turquoise, emerald 
and sapphire, from which property they have derived 
their names. The different tints of blue and green 
are seen in many of the hot wells. The geyser artist 
has left a masterpiece in the middle basin of the Fire- 
hole Valley — the Prismatic Lake, once an immense 
geyser. It is a beautiful sheet of water somewhat 
oblong in shape, 400 feet in its longest diameter. The 
center of this pool is dark blue, shading into a lighter 
tint of the same color; then comes a zone of delicate 
yellow, fading into orange. Outside its rim there is a 
brilliant red deposit which almost imperceptibly 
shades into the different tints of purple and brown, all 
upon a gray background, the pulverized silicate 
deposits surrounding the diminutive lake. It is a 



NORRIS BASIN TO MAMMOTH HOT SPRINGS 37 

picture of the geyser artist to which no painter's 
brush can ever do justice. The greatest variety of 
colors and most delicate blending of tints are seen on 
the artistically carved surfaces of the Minerva and 
Jupiter Terraces below the Mammoth Hot Springs. 
These pictures on the terraced walls exhibit all the 
colors of the rainbow, and the blending of the many 
tints is so delicate that the shading between them is 
absolutely insensible. The student of nature's picture 
gallery will have to acknowledge: 

"But who can paint 
Like Nature? Can imagination boast, 
Amid its gay creation, hues like hers?" 

— Thomson. 

FROM NORRIS BASIN TO MAMMOTH HOT SPRINGS. 

The visitor who leaves Norris Basin does so deeply 
impressed with what he has seen and heard. He has 
looked with awe upon the effects of the fearful under- 
ground power. He has seen nothing beautiful. 
While in the smoking basin he was made to feel that 
if by any sudden change the steaming vents and roar- 
ing craters should become blocked, an explosion would 
occur that might equal the recent catastrophe wrought 
by Mount. Pelee. He has seen nature in its angriest 
mood and with a certain sense of relief resumes his 
journey in the direction of a more peaceful, restful 
scenery. The smell of sulphur is stronger in the 
Norris Basin than in any of the others, and all of the 
surroundings impress the visitor with the thought that 
he has escaped a calamity when he again breathes the 
pure mountain air away from the dreadful basin. 
After such an experience nothing could be more pleas- 



38 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

ant and refreshing than the drive to Mammoth Hot 
Springs, a distance of twenty miles over one of the 
best roads in the Park, which is sprinkled at regular 
intervals to keep it free from dust. This road is a mas- 
terpiece of road-making. In manj^ places it is cut out 
of solid rock and has a stone wall on the canyon side. It 
skirts a number of charming little lakes. On one of 
these we saw a number of ducks accompanied by large 
families of tiny chicks but a few days old taking their 
first lessons in the art of swimming. Their mothers 
scented danger on our approach and urged them to 
increase their speed in the direction of safety. At the 
same time we discovered a flock of geese in the tall 
grass fringing the lake. They left their hiding-place 
and floated gracefully over the glass-like, smooth sur- 
face of the lake. The road passes through Gibbon 
Valley and for some distance follows the river of the 
same name. The canyon is closed in by pine-clad 
mountains, and on the way views are obtained of 
Mount Schurz, named after Carl Schurz; Mount 
Holmes, so called in honor of the distinguished anat- 
omist and poet, and the Electric Peak. A few miles 
from Norris Basin is Roaring Mountain on the right, 
the summit 8,000 feet above the level of the sea, 
riddled with steaming vents and craters. The whole 
canyon is a geyser region dotted with hot wells and 
springs. Little Beaver Lake owes its existence to the 
busy animal which gave it its name. The numerous 
beavers living in this locality obstructed a creek by 
building a zigzag dam several feet in height and at 
least thirty yards long. The beaver is not only an 
industrious animal, but he is endowed at the same 
time with no inconsiderable engineering talent. He 



NOKKIS BASIN TO MAMMOTH HOT SPRINGS 39 

will cut a tree six and more inches in diameter on the 
bank of a river, creek or lake, in such a way that it 
will fall in the right direction. All beavers evidently 
do not possess the engineering talent in the same 
degree, and it seems, to judge from their work, that 
they have recognized overseers to plan the work. I 
found a number of years ago in the northern part of 
Michigan, a beaver-cutting in the form of a stump on 
the edge of a river that proved the correctness of this 
statement. About a foot above this stump the tree, 
six inches in diameter, had been cut through one-half 
on the wrong side. At that stage of wood-cutting a 
consultation must have been held, as the cutting was 
done later on the opposite side and the tree fell in the 
desired direction. Along the banks of the Firehole 
River I observed many beaver-cuttings, and some of 
the trees, owing to ignorance or lack of proper 
instruction, fell in the wrong direction out of reach 
to be used in the construction of the proposed dam. 

The thirsty traveler can refresh himself at Apol- 
linaris Spring, a few yards from the road in the dense 
forest on the right side of the road — a delicious spring 
of natural Apollinaris water, as refreshing as the 
genuine article from the German springs. A point of 
great interest awaits the tourist when he is in sight of 
volcanic glass, the Obsidian Cliff. The columns of 
pentagonal-shaped blocks of obsidian, rising some 250 
feet above the., road, reflect the rays of the sun mirror- 
like. This glass is jet black and quite opaque, with 
traces of similar formation variegated with streaks of 
red and yellow. This volcanic glass is exceedingly 
hard and was used by the Indians for arrowheads. 
Swan Lake Basin is a favorite camping-ground for 



40 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

deer and elk during the winter. It is a prairie-like 
expansion of the valley covered with a luxurious 
growth of grass. 

Golden Gate, four miles from Mammoth Springs, 
is a rugged, narrow pass between the base of Bunsen's 
Peak and the southern extremity of Terrace Mountain, 
through which flows the west branch of the Gardiner 
River. The wall-like cliffs are covered with sulphur 
moss, imparting to them the appearance of old gold. 
It is in this pass where the government has spent 
much money and where the engineer of the Park, 
Captain Chittenden, has displayed great skill in cut- 
ting the road through solid rock. 

Passing through the Golden Gate, the road by 
many curves enters the Silver Gate and the Hoodoos, 
a wild region covered with immense white rocks 
thrown about in great confusion. This region was 
formerly considered inaccessible and was frequently 
sought as a hiding b}^ the Indians when at war among 
themselves or with the white men. From this point 
the road descends on a sharp incline until the tourist 
is in sight of 

MAMMOTH HOT SPRINGS. 

There is a strong contrast between Mammoth Hot 
Springs and the geyser basins. In the distant past 
there were undoubtedly many large geysers here, as is 
evident from the number of extinct craters and the 
character of formation. Liberty Cap and Devil's 
Thumb in all probability belong to this class. There 
are no geysers here now, but many hot wells and 
springs. This place is noted for the plastic character 
of the formation. There are no geyser noises, very 



MAMMOTH HOT SPRINGS 41 

little steam, and the air is almost entirely free from 
the disagreeable odor of sulphur that pervades the air 
of the geyser basins. The hot springs perform their 
artistic work silentl}^ and without interruption. The 
terrible is absent here; works of art meet the eye at 
every turn. The present active portion of the hot 
springs is located on the eastern slope of Terrace 
Mountain, from fifty to 300 feet above the plateau 
upon which the hotel and Fort Yellowstone are con- 
structed. In contemplating the wonderful works 
nature exhibits here for inspection and study, we can 
not resist the thought: 

"Those things are better which are perfected 
by nature than those things which are finished 
by art." — Cicero. 

In examining the many objects of interest here, 
the visitor must consider himself in the atelier of a 
master sculptor and painter. Liberty Cap, at the 
foot of Terrace i\Iountain, is a cone-shaped column 
fifty-two feet high with an extinct crater at its sum- 
mit. Near by and partially imbedded in the hillside 
is the Devil's Thumb, a lower but wider cone of simi- 
lar origin and formation. 

The Minerva Terrace has a hot spring on the sum- 
mit with a scanty and irregular water supply. The 
water is heavily charged with carbonate of lime, so 
that any article placed where the water can run over 
it is socn coated with a hard white crust of carbonate 
of lime. The articles sold in one of the shops are 
allowed to remain immersed in the water for three 
days. The pools of hot water are fringed with 



42 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

stalactitic masses in all possible shapes, presenting 
the most delicate coloring of various tints. 

Jupiter Terrace, the largest of the group, with an 
elevation of about lOO feet, is the center of attraction, 
presenting as it does the most exquisite plastic forms 
and the greatest variety of coloring and shades of 
tint. Viewed as a whole, the surface appears as a 
solid cascade, over which the hot water flows in a very 
thin sheet in minute ripples and wavelets correspond- 
ing with the irregularities of the formation. The 
picture on the carved stone wall is as pleasing as it is 
imposing. The grooves, ridges and gentle curves 
upon the recent formation add to the beauty of the 
scene and enhance the charm of the coloration. The 
absence of gurgling and hissing noises and of large 
volumes of steam imparts to the whole terrace region 
a peaceful aspect, and the magnificent panorama is 
changed from time to time by new formations and the 
varying quantity of water issuing from the hot wells. 
Among the most interesting of the extinct craters is 
Devil's Kitchen. Through an opening large enough 
to admit an adult one can descend a ladder into the 
kitchen. The moist and heated atmosphere is oppres- 
sive, and no one remains longer than a few minutes 
before he feels an urgent desire to come to the surface 
for fresh air. There are a number of smaller terraces, 
but the Jupiter overshadows them so much in grandeur 
and beauty that they hardly deserve mention here. 
After all. Mammoth Hot Springs is not without a 
baby geyser. The Orange Geyser has to answer for 
his species and is much admired by the visitors who 
begin the inspection of the Park from this point. It 
consists of an oblong mound of geyser deposits twenty 



MAMMOTH HOT SPRINGS 43 

feet in height. The diminutive geyser, which spouts 
on a small scale without ceasing, and the brilliant dis- 
play of colors are its chief attractions. 

The Mammoth Hotel, facing the new park, is a 
large and commodious building. It is the only hotel 
in the Park that employs colored waiters in the 
dining-room. A band plays every evening, during and 
after dinner, for the entertainment of the guests. The 
headquarters of the military force, consisting of cav- 
alry under command of Major John Pitcher, is located 
here and is known as Fort Yellowstone. Major 
Pitcher takes great interest in the development of the 
Park, and is a favorite with his men as well as with 
the visitors to the park. The little Post Hospital is 
open to civilians in need of medical or surgical service, 
a great privilege for the visitors as well as inhabitants 
of the Park. Drs. Usher and Skinner are the medical 
officers now on duty. 

From here our little party made an excursion to 
Gardiner, the railway terminal to the north entrance 
to the Park. The little hamlet faces the entrance 
to the Park. The road descends in a gentle incline 
the entire distance, six miles, and follows Gardiner 
River, a beautiful mountain stream. Not far from 
Mammoth Hot Springs the river runs several hundred 
yards parallel with Boiling River, the outlet of the 
Hot Springs, which finally pours its boiling water into 
the cold bosom of the mountain stream. It is here 
that the fisherman can stand on the narrow strip of 
land separating the two rivers, catching trout on one 
side and cooking them on the other without changing 
his position. The scenery along the entire drive is 
beautiful, and as the road is sprinkled, the drive is 



44 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

made more pleasant by the absence of dust. The 
arched entrance to the Park, of solid volcanic stone, is 
nearing completion and is a credit to the architect 
who designed it, as well as the master mason who has 
the work in charge. The railway station at Gardiner 
is a unique structure. The building has a stone foun- 
dation upon which rests the superstructure of immense 
pine logs in the bark. The shed consists of upright 
pine logs of similar size which support the roof. 
Gardiner has a large general store and seven saloons, 
and a number of log houses for laboring men and 
their families. From here Electric Peak, with 
gulches filled with snow, stands out in bold relief as a 
conspicuous landmark which can be seen from a great 
distance. It has received its name from the fact that 
it is the center of violent thunderstorms and that it 
unsettles the compass when brought too near its bare 
peak. 

FROM MAMMOTH HOT SPRINGS TO THE GRAND CANYON. 

The distance from Mammoth Hot Springs to the 
Grand Canyon is thirty-two miles. We made the trip 
Wednesday, July 14th. We retraced our steps as far 
as Norris Basin, where we stopped for lunch. From 
Norris Basin the road ascends gradually to the Divide, 
more than 8,000 feet above the level of the sea. The 
wide valley, the Virginia Valley, is heavily timbered 
with pine, and owing to the high altitude and the 
scarcity of water, vegetation is scanty and animals of 
all kinds avoid this region. As this road is not 
sprinkled, the clouds of dust proved very annoying. 
Literally, we were forced to breathe and eat dust. A 
white post marks the exact point of the Divide. We 



GRAND CANYON OF THE YELLOWSTONE 45 

were hardly conscious that we had reached the water- 
shed, the parting of the waters for the Atlantic and 
Pacific slopes. But such was the case. Of one thing 
we were certain, namely, that in this instance Cowper 
was wrong when he wrote: 

"Mountains imposing 
Make enemies of nations who had else, 
Like kindred drops, been mingled into one." 

We know that the people on both sides were one 
in thought and action, and that, regardless of the 
Divide, they were loyal to the same government and 
loved and admired the same flag. Descending from 
the Divide, the verdure of the soil again appeared and 
increased in loveliness as we approached our destina- 
tion. 

THE GRAND CANYON OF THE YELLOWSTONE. 

"Give me an ounce of civet, good apothecary, 
to sweeten my imagination." 

— Sh akespeare. 

From all he has read and heard, the visitor to the 
Yellowstone Park expects to find its greatest wonder 
on reaching the Grand Canyon. In this anticipation 
he will not be disappointed. Much as he may have 
admired the geyser basins, the hot wells and springs, 
the primeval forest, the rich flora and fauna, the 
bubbling brooks and rushing rivers, the Grand 
Canyon will reveal to him the most precious works of 
nature's school of art. The moment this great cleft 
in the very midst of the high plateau of the Rocky 
Mountains is in sight, he forgets the annoyance caused 



46 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

by the clouds of dust on the way over the Divide, and 
at once his eyes feast on the wonders it contains, and 
upon his ears falls the music of the nearby upper falls 
of the famous Yellowstone. Before he goes any 
farther it is well for him to ask for an ounce of civet, 
that he may prepare his mind and soul for what awaits 
him when he begins sight-seeing next day, after a 
refreshing sleep during the first night. It needs a 
mental preparation of the right kind to see what there 
is offered to be seen in this, the most fascinating spot 
of the Park. The man or woman who turns away 
from this great canyon dissatisfied is hard to please and 
must be classified with the pessimists referred to by 
the poet when he said: 

•'Ah, how unjust to Nature and himself 
Is thoughtless, thankless, inconsistent man!" 

— Young, 

The Canyon Hotel is a plain, large frame building 
painted in slate color and with a red shingle roof. It 
is well managed, and from the veranda facing south a 
fine view is obtained of the surrounding country. In 
the distance the snow-clad peaks of a range of moun- 
tains project far above the level of the vast meadow 
plateau on the opposite side of the river. To the left 
is an undulating, dark green sea of the primeval pine 
forest, lost on the summit of a low range of mountains 
far away. To the right the canyon widens into the 
vast expanse of pasture of Hayden Valley, fringed by 
forest in the direction of the setting sun. Behind and 
on each side of the hotel is an undulating meadow, the 
favorite place for the evening promenade of the mule- 
deer. 



i 



SUPPER FOR A SILVERTIP BEAR 47 

SUPPER FOR A SILVERTIP BEAR. 

Like most of the hotels in the Park, the Canyon 
has its regular bear guests during the open season. 
About 300 yards west of the hotel, in a narrow, shallow 
valley near the edge of the forest, is the feeding place. 
The regular time for the bears to avail themselves of 
the hospitality of the hotel is from eight to nine 
o'clock in the evening. The visitors congregate 
behind the brim of a hill facing the feeding ground. 
The bear attendance is somewhat irregular; seldom 
less than two make their appearance at the expected 
time. When we attended this performance the audi- 
ence was large and certainly appreciative, when at 
half past eight an enormous silvertip, followed by a 
cub, rushed out of the dark woods and ran at full speed 
down the short, sharp incline and at once, without any 
preliminary ceremony, attacked what had been depos- 
ited for supper. He was hungry, and reached out right 
and left and devoured the food with haste and a keen 
relish. The little one was not as greedy, but did his 
share in disposing of the food supply. The large audi- 
ence undoubtedly had something to do with the speed 
with which the food disappeared, as was evident when 
the monster silvertip grasped a large bone with his 
giant jaws and disappeared as unceremoniously as he 
came at a full run up the steep bear path and into the 
dense, dark woods, the little one following at his heels. 

The road follows the river bank for two miles and a 
half, where it terminates at Inspiration Point, near the 
end of the picturesque part of the Grand Canyon. The 
canyon, the rapids and the falls can be viewed from 
different points with and without names. The points 



48 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

from which the wonders of the canyon can be viewed 
to greatest advantage are Point Lookout, Grand 
View, Inspiration Point and Artist's Point. The 
canyon itself as far as it can be seen is a. tortuous 
excavation out of a complicated rock formation, with 
steep, sculptured inclines from 300 to 400 yards wide, 
narrowing down to the bed of the river. From the 
hotel to Inspiration Point is two miles and a half; in 
reaching the same place the water travels nine miles 
in the zigzag, rock-lined and rock- floored bed of the 
river, dashing over falls and rapids from one end of 
the canyon to the other. Following the road down- 
ward, a bridle path on the left leads to Mount Wash- 
burne, named after the late Elihu B. Washburne, one 
of our ablest statesmen and father of Hon. Hempsted 
Washburne, ex-mayor of Chicago. Mount Washburne 
is more than what its name implies; it is in reality a 
range of mountains, from the summit of which several 
bald peaks pierce the sky. The distance from the 
hotel to one of its peaks is twelve miles, and as the 
journey can be made the whole distance on horse- 
back, this side trip is a pleasant and profitable one. 
A few hundred yards farther on from the mountain 
path is an isolated reminder of the glacial period in 
the form of an immense granite boulder at least fifteen 
feet in height. It would be guesswork by thousands 
of years to fix the time when this landmark of that 
renmote period was left behind by the ocean of ice. 

GRAND CANYON OF THE YELLOWSTONE RIVER. 

To undertake to describe Grand Canyon is a thank- 
less task, from which with few exceptions the visitors 
refrain for reasons which grow with the progress of 



GRAND CANYON OF YELLOWSTONE RIVER 49 

the inspection. The immensity of the chasm is appar- 
ent, no matter from what side or point it is viewed. 
Who knows how this enormous cleft in the rock was 
made.-* The eye can not fathom its depth with any- 
thing approaching a correct estimate. It is only by 
comparing certain objects that we can realize that 
time and a combination of forces have chiseled away 
the rock and lowered the river to the depth of 2,000 
feet. Rain, snow, ice, heat, water and chemical 
action have been the chisels and hammers employed 
in nature's workshop in accomplishing the stupendous 
task. In a slow but persistent manner the original 
cleft, undoubtedly of volcanic origin, has been widened 
and deepened to the present dimensions, and the same 
processes are in operation to-day and will continue to 
modify the general aspects of this wonderful waterway. 

Hayden Valley above the upper falls was originally 
a lake, which has been drained by the deepening of the 
canyon. The rock formation as seen on the surface 
of the steep slopes is a very complicated one. Car- 
bonate of lime, silica, sulphur and granite constitute 
the principal ingredients of the composite mass. 
Looking into this awful chasm, two things at once 
attract attention — the irregularities on the surface of 
the inclosing walls and the richness of their coloration. 
The walls are carved and painted. The chisel of 
time has made furrows of pleasing design, castles, 
towers, minarets, cupolas, doorways, columns and 
ruins in profusion. The great variety of carving and 
architecture characterizes the work of the mechanical, 
thermal and chemical agents which have combined 
here in making a pathway for the restless river below. 
In looking at this prodigious rock defect and contem- 

4 



50 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

plating the forces which brought it about, we are 
in the best possible mood to appreciate the meaning 
of 

"He cutteth out rivers among the rocks; and 
his eye seeth every precious thing."— yb3 

and 

"Stones are hollowed by constant drops of water." 

— Ovidius. 

The entire canyon is a picture gallery. The pre- 
vailing colors are yellow, brown and silver gray. 
However, nature's artists have despised here the pri- 
mary colors. They have shown a decided preference 
for mixed colors, and the most delicate shading has 
been and remains their specialty. As an aid to recog- 
nize the different primary colors, I took with me a 
color scale, but soon found that none of the colors 
shown in the scale could be matched by the colors 
fixed on the canvas of stone. The yellow, for 
instance, showed so many shades of this color, from a 
deep ochre to the most delicate tints of this color. 
The same applied to red and blue. It is the shading 
and intermingling of colors that stamp the art exhibi- 
tion of the Grand Canyon as unique, the like of which 
can not be seen in any other part of the world, be it 
the product of nature or the brush of the most famous 
artists. The canyon viewed as a whole impresses one 
with its vastness and variety combined with minuteness 
of detail. The last distinctive feature is keenly felt 
when it is examined in detail from the different most 
advantageous points of observation. It is when we 
come to a detailed description of this gem of the Yel- 
lowstone Park, exhibiting as it does in no ordinary 




CANYON OF THE YELLOWSTONE. 



UPPER FALLS 51 

way nature's unlimited resources and artistic power, 
that we begin to realize the utter inadequacy of the 
pen and the brush to do it justice. Pen pictures, as 
well as colors on canvas, fail alike in conveying any- 
thing approaching a correct idea of the grandeur and 
beauty of the original. The best description of this 
great canyon is but a silly composition when com- 
pared with the reality, and the most famous paintings 
are but daubs when contrasted with the pictures on 
the stone wall. An attempt to reproduce the fascinat- 
ing beauties of this wonderful natural aqueduct by 
writing or painting is a laudable effort, but author 
and artist will finish the task with a feeling of unwor- 
thiness and disappointment. A correct idea of this 
masterpiece of nature can only be gained by a per- 
sonal and careful inspection. 

UPPER FALLS. 

Yellowstone River is the outlet of the mountain 
lake of the same name. It is a magnificent stream of 
pure mountain water about the size of the Rhine at 
Schaffhausen, Switzerland. It meanders through the 
Hayden Valley as a quiet, peaceful stream until it 
reaches the rapids some distance above the entrance 
to the canyon. From that point through the entire 
canyon the water is agitated furiously in passing over 
the falls and rapids. Standing upon a projecting rock 
a little below and above the level of the Upper Falls 
and looking up the river, scattered granite boulders of 
enormous size contest the space with the water as it 
dashes down the rapids, when, at a sudden turn of the 
river, the current strikes a perpendicular stone wall 
and is repulsed and seeks freedom on the opposite 



52 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

side only to meet the same fate. The mad current 
again makes a turn and with increasing speed rushes 
over the rapids. The fight of the water with the 
unfriendly canyon has only begun. Three falls from 
six to eight feet in height at short intervals increase 
the speed of the turbulent stream and prepare it for 
what is next to happen. With ever-increasing veloc- 
ity the mighty current next leaps over a precipice 
140 feet in height and strikes the deep basin cut out 
of solid rock with a roaring noise, rebounds geyser- 
like and in the form of a halo of fine spray in which 
the rays of the afternoon sun paint a rainbow which 
spans the yawning gap in the form of a most graceful 
arch. On the furious stream rushes, bearing upon its 
thousands of little crests the white foam of rage. No 
rest for the roaring torrent; on it speeds from rapid to 
rapid in the too-narrow, unyielding bed of rock with 
ever-increasing speed and growing impatience to reach 
some quiet sunlit basin for a rest. No rest, no halt in 
the yawning chasm. A still more cruel fate lies in 
wait in fearful proximity. What looks like a haven 
of rest ahead is but the gathering point for a frightful 
fall. Between two perpendicular rocks only seventy 
feet apart the narrow bed of the river contracts to a 
point too narrow for such a desperate race. But a 
halt is an impossibility; through this narrow gate the 
angry, whirling, rushing torrent must make its leap over 

THE LOWER FALLS. 

Let us witness this fearful event from Artist's 
Point, where the battle between water and rocks and 
the struggle between force and resistance can be seen 
and felt more vividly than from any other of the innu- 



LOWER FALLS 63 

merable points of observation. It is not difficult to 
locate the central figure that has attracted artists from 
far and near, and from this point thousands witness 
annually one of nature's grandest exhibitions. The 
ear catches the roaring, thundering noise; the eye at 
once the place from whence it comes. There it is! 
From a dizzy height we look down into the awful 
abyss below. A mighty river of olive-green water 
sprinkled with snow-white foam is leaping in a con- 
tinuous sheet 308 feet in height into the giant stone 
basin below. It strikes the stone foundation with the 
fury of a cyclone, bent upon revenge for the hostile 
reception it has met with in the canyon. But the 
canyon is equal to the desperate onslaught of the 
frenzied foe. The basin spits out the agitated water 
and throws wave after wave high into the air, and in 
this turmoil their periphery is pulverized and fills the 
gorge below for hundreds of feet with a spray and a 
mist that rise in a vain attempt to escape from the 
iron grasp of the relentless, unmerciful chasm. The 
dreadful roaring, heard miles away from the seat of 
conflict between stone and water, resistance and 
weight, announces to the amazed and speechless spec- 
tator the majesty and power of nature's conflicting 
forces. The spectacle is inspiring and yet fearful. 
No wonder a sense of fear and danger takes possession 
of the visitor, and he clings instinctively to a rock, a 
tree or the solid framework which surrounds the look- 
out. In the presence of such tremendous manifesta- 
tions of power, even these supports seem unreliable, 
and the feeling of absolute safety returns only when 
he turns his eyes away from the seat of turmoil and 
retreats into the quiet, peaceful solitude of the adja- 



54 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

cent virgin forest. Let us walk to the nearby Obser- 
vation Point and seek an acquaintance with an 

EAGLE FAMILY. 

Of all the birds the eagle exercises the greatest 
caution in the selection of his home. He makes no 
mistakes in the choice of a location. He builds his 
nest in places inaccessible to man and animals he has 
to fear. His powerful wings will carry him to a 
height out of reach of his would-be destroyers. He is 
fond of the mountain climate and builds his home 
upon one of the most inaccessible cliffs. There he 
dwells and there he rears his small family. Is it any 
wonder that the Grand Canyon is inhabited by so 
many eagle families? Nearly 2,000 feet below Obser- 
vation Point is a tapering column of rough stones 
which looks very much like the chimney of one of 
our large manufacturing establishments. Upon the 
very summit of this pile of stones is a large nest made 
of sticks. In this nest the naked eye can detect a 
small, restless body not larger than a sparrow. We 
avail ourselves of the use of an excellent field-glass 
and recognize a large young eagle and beside him an 
unhatched eagle's ^z"^. The bird is hungry. He 
opens and closes his soft bill at short intervals, but 
there is nothing to eat. He is too young to trust to 
his wings, he is dependent on his parents to supply 
him with food. He flops his imperfect wings to pre- 
pare them for flight, a task he is confident he will soon 
be able to perform. He looks anxiously in all direc- 
tions for his mother. She left him alone and has gone 
in search of food with which to satisfy his hunger. 
He sees eagles sailing up and down in the deep canyon 



INSPIRATION POINT 55 

and high in the air, but his mother is not among 
them. Where is she? Why does she not return 
for so long? She left with the dawn of day, and it 
is now nearly noon. She has probably had bad luck 
in catching trout in the roaring stream below, or per- 
haps she has satisfied her own desire for food and has 
failed to secure another fish for the hungry babe. 
Something was wrong. I saw this same helpless baby 
eagle again late in the evening. He was still alone. 
His actions left no doubt that his hunger had increased. 
He craned his neck in all directions, but in vain. His 
mother had not returned, or she returned without food 
and had gone on another search. Let us hope that 
the little, lonely, hungry, helpless eagle was made 
happy before darkness set in by the return of his 
mother with an ample supply of food. There the 
eagle nest was built years ago, there successive gener- 
ations have been hatched upon that hard bed of 
sticks, and from there year after year the young eagles 
have looked down into the bottom of the yawning gap 
and up to the blue sky above the sculptured cliffs until 
their wings were strong enough to make them free and 
independent and relieve their mother from all mater- 
nal care and worry. There that nest will remain for 
years to come, safe from the attacks of inquisitive 
man and bloodthirsty animals, for 

"Strong is thy dwelling-place, and thou 
puttest thy nest in a rock." — Numbers xxiv, 21. 

INSPIRATION POINT. 

On the way from the carriage-drive to the immense 
rock jutting out from a narrow neck which connects it 
with the brim of the canyon, called Inspiration Point, 



56 ' YELLOWSTONE PARK 

a conspicuous sign on the left bears a legend, the 
meaning of which in our country has no practical 
application. It reads: "Castle Ruins." We as a 
nation have had no castle builders, and we have had 
no use for anything even suggestive of royalty. But 
away down in that deep gap and clinging to the steep 
incline rising from the bed of the river can be seen the 
ruins of a great castle. Can it be that a prehistoric 
race inhabited this cleft in the earth perhaps thou- 
sands of years ago.? This can not be; the ruins bear 
the impress of a more recent age. They look like the 
ruins of castles we see in Spain, France, Switzerland 
and Germany, along the banks of the Rhine; the ruins 
of castles built during the feudal times. But here are 
the ruins of an immense castle. Look at the broken- 
down strong wall, the narrow streets, the parapets, 
the dilapidated watch towers, immense halls, and 
numberless rooms partly filled with the debris of 
fallen ceilings and caved-in, crumbling walls. Scat- 
tered over the whole castle area are isolated stones 
of all sizes from which time and the elements have 
erased the chisel marks. Between these stones, in 
the form of white and gray sand, is the mortar 
which once cemented them together. Truly, if these 
ruins do not tell the story of a castle, as indicated 
by the label upon the signboard, the imitation carved 
by nature is so true as to deceive the most experienced 
traveler. But now, let us take one last, long look at 
the can3^on from Inspiration Point. Walk slowly, 
leave all irreverent and irrelevant thoughts behind and 
enter into communion with nature, for 

"To him who in the love of Nature holds 
Communion with her visible forms, she speaks 
A various language." — Bryant. 



I 




LOWER FALLS OF THE YELLOWSTONE. 



INSPIRATION POINT 57 

Tread softly as you approach the spot from whence 
you will look upon the canyon's choicest artistic treas- 
ures. Tread softly as you pass over a deep crack 
which has widened four inches during the last seven- 
teen years, because who knows but your weight may 
suffice in completing the fissure, with the awful cer- 
tainty that in such an event you will follow the rock 
into the hungry abyss from whence there is no return 
this side of eternity. And now, grasping the rock on 
the left or the balustrade in front, open your eyes and 
study the panorama that unfolds itself to your aston- 
ished gaze. I need not tell in what direction to look 
first. You can not help it; you will look down, down 
2,000 feet, where this terrible cleft ends in the narrow, 
tortuous bed of the river. How small the river looks! 
You have seen the mighty river above the Upper Falls. 
You have seen its water spouted from the basin below 
the Lower. What has become of it.-* Has the greater 
part entered some unknown subterranean passage, to 
reappear as a stately river on either side of the Rocky 
Mountain slopes.? No. It is the same river, which 
only distance has reduced in size. It is the same tur- 
bulent water that has dashed down the long rapids and 
plunged over the falls. It is rushing on over the steep 
rapids below, and you follow the serpentine olive- 
green thread bearing the white foam of anger until it 
is lost in the somber cleft of the unknown part of the 
canyon. You hear the roaring of the Lower Falls, and 
turn to the right and catch a glimpse of the solid wall of 
water as it begins its plunge into the bottom of the 
canyon 308 feet below. You look across the frighten- 
ing gap and look upon a wall of trees, slender, straight 
as an arrow, their tops adorned by rectangular 



58 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

branches, bearing tufts of dark green, awl-shaped 
leaves. You see eagles, ravens, fishhawks and swal- 
lows cross and recross the threatening, yawning chasm 
without fear. The sense of danger disappears like 
flakes of snow before the warm breath of returning 
spring. Confidence returns, and you are now in a 
proper mood to study the artistic exhibits of the won- 
derful canyon. You will look in vain for what is ordi- 
narily understood by a picture. There is no madonna, 
no Venus, no Apollo, neither landscapes nor paintings 
recalling stirring events in history. Nature does not 
waste her time making images of ordinary things — 
things that artists can duplicate. She employs her 
agencies in the formation of colors and mixture of 
colors, and the latter is her specialty. The delicate 
tints of flowers are familiar to all, but here in this 
canyon they are thrown on the cold, lifeless stone 
wall. Look where you will and you will see tints that 
you have never seen before, tints not to be found in 
any color scales, tints that have never been named. I 
will mention only a few colors that had any resem- 
blance to what I found in the color scale — yellow, 
green, blue, brown, red, black, silver gray, slate, 
amber, turquoise. The shading of one color with 
another is often so delicate that it is impossible to 
determine where one ends and the other begins. 
This is a great school for artists. Let them come 
here and learn how to mix colors, because it is their 
province to imitate nature as nearly as can be done 
with their limited means. The effect of sunlight on 
these painted walls is marvelous. To appreciate to 
the fullest extent the beauty of this natural art gal- 
lery, the canyon must be seen when the rays of the 



INSPIRATION POINT 59 

sun illuminate it from the east, from high noon and 
from the west. Some of the steady colors do not 
change with the variations in the direction of the sun. 
An immense pile of rocks near the edge of the racing 
river looks as though each one of its huge stones had 
been dipped in blood, no matter what time of day it 
is seen. Some of the half domes cut out of the rock 
retain their sulphur color from dawn until long after 
sunset. The somber black appears only blacker with 
the approach of night. The pink and sky and violet 
blue are made more brilliant by the slanting rays of the 
sun. Let us turn away from these fascinating colora- 
tions and look around for a moment for more familiar 
things. Across the river and in the very depth of the 
canyon is a tall dead pine tree. It has lost some of 
its bare arms. At the very tip of the trunk a few ter- 
minal branches serve as a foundation for an eagle's 
nest. In this nest are two young eagles engaged in 
childish play, careful, however, during their frolic to 
avoid coming too near the dangerous edge of their 
limited playground. Their mother has left them hours 
ago, and they are anxiously awaiting her return, con- 
fident she will bring them long-expected food. Two 
other nests of the same size and construction, perched 
on the most inaccessible cliffs, are uninhabited. Here 
and there scattered pine trees growing out of the 
rock, with their roots wedged in fissures of the inhos- 
pitable host, have labored hard for half a century or 
more to keep the stunted trunk, short branches and 
tufts of emerald-green leaves from starving. Small 
and large crevices in the rock have accumulated in the 
course of time enough soil for the growth of little 
patches of tender grass of a pale green color which 



60 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

contrasts strongly with the gray or light yellow back- 
ground. Take in one more sweeping glance at the 
whole magnificent panorama and you will conclude 
with the immortal poet: 

"All nature is but art unknown." 

— Shakespeare. 

HAYDEN VALLEY. 

Hayden Valley is the connecting link between Yel- 
lowstone Lake and the Grand Canyon. By the road 
which follows the course of the Yellowstone River the 
distance between the two places is seventeen miles. 
We made this trip Thursday, July i6th. The valley is 
for the most part an immense meadow inclosed by tree- 
clad hills, the footstools of the distant mountain ranges. 
The first object of interest met with is the sulphur 
mountain, an isolated, bald, gray and yellow peak 
with hot sulphur springs on the summit and sides 
and a geyser at its base. The landscape throughout 
the entire valley is beautiful, varied from time to time 
by groups of trees, the winding river, babbling brooks, 
and the appearance and disappearance of distant 
mountain peaks. This valley is the favorite rendez- 
vous of the elk and deer during the long and severe 
winter months. 

A high column of vapor announces that we are 
nearing another point of interest. In a shallow ra- 
vine facing the road we are within a few steps 
of the Mud Geyser. The basin is an immense one 
in the shape of a funnel of prodigious size with a 
perpendicular stone wall behind some forty or fifty 
feet in height. Two craters belch at short, regular 
intervals into this basin a mouse-colored boiling fluid, 



YELLOWSTONE LAKE 61 

each act accompanied by a noise suggestive of a steam 
pump underneath the sizzing, boiling, steaming liquid 
mud. On the opposite side of the right hill inclosing 
the ravine, and on the same level, is a hot well of clear 
water with an artistic crater resembling the gable of a 
diminutive house painted a green-blue color, from the 
lower open end of which the hot water is thrown a 
foot and more in height into a shallow basin, from 
where it returns whence it came. A number of small 
hot wells in front of these two large ones emit steam 
strongly impregnated with sulphur. 

YELLOWSTONE LAKE. 

Much has been said and written about the beauty 
of mountain lakes. I have seen those of Switzerland, 
Norway, Austria, Italy, Siberia and Japan, and none 
of them, beautiful as most of them are, are entitled to 
precedence over Yellowstone Lake. Some of these 
lakes are too large, others are too small; the Yellow- 
stone, as far as size is concerned, meets the ideal. 
The Yellowstone is a real mountain lake, a lake not 
only wedged in between mountains, but upon a moun- 
tain. Its altitude is 7,738.49 feet. Some of the most 
famous mountain lakes are so inclosed by precipitous 
walls that little else but water, stone and sky can be 
seen. The Yellowstone is not so imprisoned. It 
occupies the center of an immense cup-shaped, heavily 
timbered plateau with snow-clad mountain peaks in 
the distance all around, from which it receives its sup- 
ply of water, serving as a reservoir for the melting 
snow and crystal springs of a large mountain district. 
Although there are no less than seventy hot-spring 
areas surrounding the lake, much of the overflow of 



62 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

which reaches its basin, the water is crystal clear 
and cold, the ideal home for the trout. It is about 
twenty-five miles long and very variable in width, 
as in many places it reaches out its arms in the 
direction of the high mountain ranges in its eagerness 
to reach them. The largest of these prolongations is 
the Thumb, so called from its resemblance to the 
thumb of the human hand. The surrounding plateau 
is from three to fifty feet above the water level, pine- 
clad, with many openings, genuine meadows, usually 
watered by a mountain spring, splendid pastures for 
the elk and deer, so numerous in this part of the Park. 
The lake is evidently a funnel-shaped basin, as it is of 
great depth in the middle, and from its margins the 
descent all around is gradual. Its beach and bottom 
are covered with sand and gravel. It is dotted by a 
number of charming little islands covered with pine, 
little emeralds set in a sea-green gem. From its banks 
the green sea of the forest extends to the tree-line at 
the base of the snow-covered peaks far, far away. 
Among the most attractive of these peaks are the 
Sleeping Giant and Mount Sheridan. The face of the 
Sleeping Giant is clean-cut, peaceful, the head and 
chest on a gentle incline, and the monster shoulders 
and back part of the head buried in a pillow of light 
brown rock. Sheridan Mountain is stern, like the 
famous general whose name it commemorates, and 
the numerous deep gulches of its sumn^it are filled 
with snow insensible to the rays of the midsummer 
sun. Yellowstone Lake teems with life. Over its 
calm, smooth, silver3> surface glide the large water 
fowl which take their summer vacation here. Swans, 
white pelicans, ducks, gulls and geese entertain the 



YELLOWSTONE LAKE 63 

fishermen when they have become tired of reeling in 
and netting the trout. Of these winged sailors, the 
snow-white, proud and sagacious swan is the most 
graceful. 

"On thy fair bosom, silver lake, 

The wild swan spreads his snowy sail, 
And around his breast the ripples break 
As down he bears before the gale." 

— Percival. 

Yellowstone Lake is the paradise for fishermen, 
skilled and unskilled. Many of the visitors to the 
Park, men and women, utilise the opportunity and 
spend much of their time engaged in the sport of fish- 
ing. I can readily conceive that to many angling is a 
genuine amusement, and with enthusiasts it becomes 
a passion. I presume, too, it is true what Izaak 
Walton said of this sport: 

"God never did make a more calm, quiet, 
innocent recreation than angling." 

It is, I imagine, a sort of recreation perhaps more 
restful than any other outdoor sport, for 

"You will find angling to be like the virtue of 
humility, which has a calmness of spirit and a 
world of other blessings attending upon it." 
— Izaak Walton. 

I doubt if this ancient authority on fishing would 
be satisfied in plying the art here, because the trout 
are so numerous and hungry that they fall an easy 
prey to unskilled hands. The number of trout caught 
here daily is almost incredible. I was informed by 
Captain Walters that one day several parties remain- 



64 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

ing over at the Lake Hotel brought in half a ton. 

The fish are most numerous at the outlet of the lake. 
All around our boat they kept jumping out of the 
water, striking for insects. The water is so clear that 
they can be seen at a depth of ten and more feet 
under and all around the boat. Standing on the 
bridge crossing the river a short distance below the 
lake, I could count from fifty to a hundred trout at 
any time at a standstill in the water at various depths, 
sculling with the tail fast enough to counteract 
the force of the current. With the exception of some 
of the salmon streams in Alaska, I had never seen such 
a sight. The fisherman can often see the fish before it 
makes the strike and watch the ensuing struggle until 
it is ended in the landing net. Three kinds of trout are 
found here — the salmon, mountain and speckled trout. 
The salmon trout is most abundant. Unfortunately, 
it is the trout most frequently hooked, and as it is 
unfit for the table, owing to the fact that most of them 
are infested with worms, when it is caught it is 
either returned or thrown away after landing. Sports- 
men bring enough trout to the Lake Hotel to be 
served daily, to the great delight of its large num- 
ber of guests. As the guests seldom remain longer 
than two or three days, the appetite for this delicacy 
is not lost. 

A little steamer, the Zillah, makes a daily trip to 
West Thumb, and on the way calls at a little island, 
where the captain, Mr. E. C. Walters, has a little 
herd of buffalo and a number of elk. The passengers 
see here the largest buffalo living. This animal, a 
monster weighing nearly a ton and a half, is a cold- 
blooded murderer. He has a bad record, as he has 



YELLOWSTONE LAKE 65 

killed, so far, four of his companions. He is now iso- 
lated. He is a surly-looking beast, and has to be 
handled with the utmost caution to prevent further 
crimes against man and beast on his part. 

The Lake Hotel, already a capacious frame building 
painted yellow, is being enlarged by the building of a 
wing nearly as large as the present building. This is 
the most desirable place in the Park to remain for at 
least several days. Fishing and the steamer trips to 
the Thumb are recreations which will be appreciated 
by most of the tourists. The nineteen-mile drive to 
the Thumb is over a new road and affords many very 
pleasing landscapes. Four miles from the hotel is the 
Natural Bridge. It is an extinct crater with one side 
blown out. In the center the bridge is not more than 
four feet in thickness and supports a pine tree about 
ten feet high. The road crosses quite a high mountain 
range, and nearly the whole distance, with the excep- 
tion of a few valley and plateau meadows, had to be 
blazed through a virgin pine forest. For several 
miles on the highest part of the mountain I found 
tumors on trees unusually prevalent. It seems certain 
that this disease is endemic here. I had observed iso- 
lated cases of tumor formation throughout the entire 
Park, but here, over a well-defined area corresponding 
with the highest part of the ridge, a large percentage 
of the trees were afflicted. Some of the trees had 
one tumor; others several, and some of them so many 
it would have been somewhat difficult to count them. 
Age appeared to have little influence as a predisposing 
cause. Some of the small trees with slender trunk 
not larger than a broom-handle were among the silent 
sufferers. The disease kills, but its malignancy varies 

6 



66 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

greatly. Many of the fallen dead trees were killed by 
the disease ; others affected in various stages of the prog- 
ress of the disease showed its effects in undermining 
their vigor by a gradual decline, and still others were 
hopelessly crippled, chronic invalids, on the sure way 
to premature death. Is the disease contagious or 
infectious, or both, or is the exciting cause present 
here in greater quantity or more virulent than else- 
where in the Park."* It would be very interesting and 
instructive to have those who have the management 
of the Park in charge inquire into this matter care- 
fully, as a solution of these questions by scientific 
investigation and experimentation would undoubtedly 
add much valuable information in solving the much- 
discussed question of the origin of tumors in the human 
subject — something upon which much new light is 
needed before any decided progress can be made con- 
cerning their prevention and more successful treat- 
ment. It seems to me that these tumors, as found in 
this part of the Park, manifest decidedly malignant 
properties. A careful anatomic examination of the 
tumors and a series of inoculation experiments of the 
same species and other trees in different localities 
might clear up the cause and nature of this endemic 
and the subject of tumor formation in trees in general. 

WEST THUMB. 

Until now West Thumb has been only a lunching 
station between the Upper Geyser Basin and Yellow- 
stone Lake for the Park tourists in following the circle 
and returning either by the way of Gardiner or 
Monida. As the distance from one point to the other 
is forty-six miles, the ride is quite a long one and 



WEST THUMB 67 

somewhat fatiguing, as the new part of the road in 
many places is not yet completed and consequently 
rough. Then, too, West Thumb has its points of 
interest which some of the tourists would like to give 
more than a glance, which is the case now. The 
hotel company proposes to erect a hotel here, some- 
thing which is very much needed. At present there 
are no provisions made for travelers to remain over 
night except the small Wylie camps. The fishing 
at the Thumb is excellent. After the completion of 
the hotel, the guests of the Lake Hotel and the one at 
this point will have an easy way to visit each other b}^ 
taking a pleasant steamboat ride of two and a half 
hours. Captain Walters is building another steamer 
that will carry 600 passengers at a time and will, 
after its completion, undoubtedly make two in place 
of one trip daily, as is the case at the present 
time. Here we improved the last opportunity to 
observe and study geyser action and hot wells. There 
is only one real geyser here, but innumerable minute 
hot springs and a number of very fine hot wells. In 
front of the lunch station is the famous hot well in 
which the trout are cooked without a change of posi- 
tion of the fisherman and without taking the fish from 
the hook, a procedure that can be witnessed daily, as 
the fish are plentiful and the water in the basin always 
boiling. With the West Thumb, we finished the 
Park tour Saturday, July i8th, but instead of return- 
ing to the west entrance from where we started, we 
continued our journey in the direction of Jackson 
Lake with the intention of seeing this genuine moun- 
tain lake and its famous background, the Teton 
Mountain. 



68 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

THE PARK FOREST. 

The preservation of the virgin forest of the Park is 
one of the greatest benefits growing out of the reser- 
vation. If the government had not acted in time, we 
would find to-day this beautiful natural park a desert 
covered with charred timber and stunted grass and 
fading flowers. This immense forest, intercepted by 
meadows large and small, has retained the moisture, 
attracted rain and has fed the innumerable springs, 
brooks, rivers and lakes. In consequence of this sys- 
tem of natural irrigation, there is a luxurious growth of 
grass in meadows and forest, and the whole Park is a 
veritable flower garden. Forest fires are carefully 
guarded against by the military force scattered in 
small numbers throughout the Park, aided by scouts 
who patrol the lines of travel and who see to it that 
the necessary precautions against fire are enforced, 
and in case of fire act promptly in extinguishing it. 
In many places the ravages of fires twenty and thirty 
years ago can be seen in the shape of fallen timber 
and a young growth of pine. It is fortunate that the 
variety of pine which grows here has the intrinsic 
capacity to restore the loss sustained by fire. The 
growth of the young tree is, however, very slow; it 
does not exceed on an average a foot each year. The 
variety of trees and shrubs growing in the Park is 
remarkably small, as the altitude for a greater diver- 
sity is too high. The prevailing tree is the white pine, 
with a scanty sprinkling of spruce, balsam fir, aspen 
and a stunted variety of red cedar. Willows and 
juniper are also common. The pine is a stately tree, 
straight as an arrow and slender. It is exceedingly 





^ 




^ 







THE PARK FOREST 69 

modest in its demands for food and moisture. It will 
grow on a rock with no visible soil, absorbing its 
scanty food supply from crevices into which the roots 
insinuate themselves. In the more yielding soil, it 
sends out its roots at a right angle from the base of 
the trunk covered at best only by a few inches of soil, 
and very often the larger roots are laid bare in the 
course of time. The crown of the full-grown tree is 
remarkably small for the size and length of the trunk. 
The young tree has branches almost from the very 
roots, becoming shorter and shorter as the apex of the 
handsome cone is reached. The young tree is the 
delight of children on Christmas evening. The pine 
tree is a friendly neighbor. It is not as aggressive as 
most of the hardwood trees and resorts to hostile meas- 
ures only in case of extreme emergency. Its ambi- 
tion from childhood to old age is to reach the sky. 

There is a remarkable uniformity in the height of 
these trees, which averages about lOO feet. A tree 
with a circumference not exceeding the arm of an adult 
is not far behind its centenarian neighbors as far as 
height is concerned. As the tree grows in height the 
lower branches die, drop off, leaving a branchless 
trunk seldom more than fourteen to sixteen inches in 
diameter clothed in a light brown, rather smooth bark. 

Nature's forester, in his desire that the trees in his 
charge should not become extinct, sows the seed liber- 
ally, often less than a foot apart. As the little trees 
send out their roots, the struggle for existence soon 
begins. Some of them must die. The survival of the 
fittest can be studied nowhere to better advantage 
than in the silent pine forests of the Park. With the 
exception of fire, there is no wholesale slaughter, no 



70 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

windfalls. The forest is so dense that it would take a 
cyclone of extraordinary violence to cut a swath. 
The forest presents all indications of interstitial death 
where life is made impossible by a too dense popula- 
tion. In large tracts of the over-populated forest, 
death, starvation and vigorous life are seen side by 
side. Barkless, branchless dead trees can be seen 
standing, leaning against a friendly neighbor and pros- 
trate on the ground. In many places the white 
corpses lie parallel, crosswise and oblique to each 
other, forming a network impassable for man and 
horse. In these cemeteries of the dead are seen the 
bleached trunks of trees that resisted wind and storm, 
cold and heat, and lived on a scanty food supply for a 
hundred years and more side by side with slender 
trunks of trees that succumbed during infancy and 
childhood. It is in places like these that starvation 
can be studied in all its phases. There is a tree show- 
ing the first symptoms of failing health. The needles 
of some of the branches have lost their deep green 
color; they have turned yellow. There is another 
whose branches are bare nearly to the point of the 
dying trunk. Next we see one without any signs of 
life, still standing in the same proud attitude as during 
its most prosperous periods in life, ready to join its 
decaying neighbors on the ground when a kindly 
storm will loosen its lifeless roots. Among all these 
scenes of disease and death life throws an encharting 
picture. Tall green pines guard the cemetery, and 
their shadow throws a somber veil over the dead, and 
in the tree-tops the evening breeze chants the funeral 
march. The pale green, soft grass and the exquisite 
subalpine flowers decorate the city of the dead 




riNES NEAR THE CHAPEL. 



THE FAUNA 71 

during the short summer, and during the winter it is 
protected by a mantle of snow. 

THE FAUNA. 

"Nature teaches animals to know their friends." 

— Shakespeare. 

One of the principal motives for the establishment 
of the Yellowstone National Park was to secure an 
advantageous place for the protection and perpetua- 
tion of our noble game. The rapid and almost com- 
plete extinction of the buffalo taught us a lesson in 
game protection which will be handed down to all 
future generations. The wholesale slaughter of this 
harmless, noble game of the western prairies was a 
national sin for which the government and the people 
can make no satisfactory excuse. Any one with any 
foresight whatever could not escape the conviction 
that unless the general government took the necessary 
steps, the elk, bighorn and antelope would in a very 
few years meet the same fate as the buffalo. The 
northwestern part of Wyoming has always been the 
home of the large noble game. The choice of the 
location of the Park was therefore a most excellent 
one. This large tract of land is one great natural 
pasture well supplied with the purest water and ample 
cover for the game in the virgin forest and inaccessible 
canyons and mountain peaks. It is, in other words, 
an ideal natural game preserve. The administration 
of the affairs of the Park under military rule has been 
such ever since it was opened that the game of all 
sorts has found here not only the requisite protection, 
but also the needed assistance during the long and 
severe winter months. All wild animals, when tor- 



72 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

tured by hunger, approach human habitations in quest 
of food. Hunger conquers fear. Hunger satisfied 
by a liberal hospitality begets confidence. Truly, 
"Nature teaches wild animals to know their friends." 
The wild animals in the Park appear to know that 
every gun that is brought into the Park is sealed b}^ 
their friends, the soldiers, and remains sealed until it 
leaves the Park. Since the soldiers have taken pos- 
session of this great national game preserve, the ani- 
mals have not heard the report of a gun. Even the 
meanest of poachers has a certain respect for the Park 
regulations. He may prowl around its immediate 
vicinity and kill the game that unknowingly trespasses 
upon the surrounding country, but he seldom looks 
for game within its precincts. The animals soon find 
out the exact limits of the preserve and are careful not 
to go beyond. Every hunter knows how soon ducks 
become tame after the open season closes. The ani- 
mals in the Park no longer regard man as their enemy. 
The kind treatment they have received has made them 
confident. This is particularly true of the game that 
winters in the Park. It is during the severe season 
that the deer, elk, antelope and mountain sheep enjoy 
the hospitality of the different posts and park hotels. 
At Yellowstone Fort and other points hundreds of 
these animals congregate and satisfy their hunger at 
the hay-racks. It is during the middle of the long 
winter that the mountain sheep, the wildest and most 
cautious of all the game, the residents of the highest 
mountain peaks, call for their rations near the dwell- 
ing-places without fear and mistrust. The bears 
sleep during the long winter, but as soon as the warm 
spring sun stimulates their sluggish circulation and 



THE FAUNA 73 

rouses them to consciousness, they remember their 
feeding-places in the rear of the different hotels and 
promptly announce themselves as their regular sum- 
mer boarders. The fierce grizzly and silvertip share 
the same table with the harmless black bear, provided 
the rations are large enough to go around, for 
"Bears, savage to others, are yet at peace 
among themselves."— /z/'Z/^;^<3:/w. 

It is safe to say that each hotel in the Park has 
from half a dozen to thirty and more of these wel- 
come, appreciative boarders. The bear resembles the 
Indian in many respects — the moment he is surrounded 
by civilization he will not work if he can get his food 
in any other way. Civilizing influences make him 
indolent. If he sees his way to appease his hunger at 
the liberal garbage pile, he will come regularly for his 
evening meal, devour it in the presence of a crowd of 
spectators, retire into the forest, perhaps pick up here 
and there a few dainties not on the menu of the gar- 
bage pile, and spends the balance of the time in sleep 
in some out-of-the-way place. This kind of a life, 
liowever, will, in the course of time, take away some 
of his bear nature and prove detrimental to his race. 

It is a source of great satisfaction to know that the 
efficient game protection has been rewarded by the 
best results. With the exception of the buffalo, all 
other game has increased. Seven years ago the num- 
ber of buffaloes in the Park was estimated at 200; the 
present number, it is believed, does not exceed twenty- 
five. The government has recently bought a herd of 
twenty which live in a well-selected inclosure near 
Fort Yellowstone. Every effort will be made to 
increase this herd and bring it gradually in contact 



74 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

with the wild buffaloes which the tourists never see. 
Captain Walters has another smaller herd on a little 
island in Yellowstone Lake. The government will 
undoubtedly improve every opportunity to increase 
the herd by new purchases of buffaloes, the property 
of private individuals in the West. Major Pitcher 
estimated the number of elk in the Park two years 
ago at 25,000. The number of deer undoubtedly is 
much larger. The Park has no extensive tracts 
adapted for antelope. The great timber reserve 
recently set aside for the purpose of securing addi- 
tional game protection and to guard against forest 
fires is a move in the right direction. This timely 
legislation is a wise one, and will eventually result in 
the extension of the present boundaries of the Park. 
Every influence should be brought to bear to make 
the Teton Mountain Range, Jackson Lake and a part 
of Jackson Hole the southern extension of the Park. 
The Teton Mountain and Jackson Lake would add 
genuine alpine sceneries to the Park, and Jackson 
Hole is the natural game preserve for elk. It is a real 
pity the manner in which this noble animal is now 
slaughtered every fall and winter, and still a greater 
pity that so many die of starvation. Jackson Hole is 
the place to look for an increase of the elk under 
proper protection. If the government would establish 
feeding stations and prohibit killing in the Park 
extension, the increase in a very few years would be 
simply fabulous. Walking through a ravine in Jackson 
Hole, I found no less than half a dozen carcasses 
from last spring, and the distance did not exceed a 
mile. I saw here a pathetic scene. Upon a project- 
ing rock lay the bleaching skeleton of a large elk. 



THE FAUNA 75 

Upon this lookout he had undoubtedly stood guard 
during prosperous, happy days. Emaciated to a skel- 
eton, he made his last exertions in climbing to this 
favorite spot; the eyes already dimmed by death took 
the last glance at the river that quenched his thirst so 
often, and at the mountain on the opposite side he had 
scaled so frequently during many seasons. His legs 
refuse to support the frail body, his head drops, his 
knees bend, and he falls lifeless upon the cold bed of 
snow. Such is the sad fate of hundreds of elk during 
an unusually severe v^^inter, and many die annually. 
This is not as it should be. The elk has served as 
food for the inhabitants of Jackson Hole ever since 
that part of the country was settled, and has given 
excellent sport to hundreds of hunters from the east 
during many seasons, and for these reasons alone he 
deserves a better fate at a time when the ranchmen's 
cattle have despoiled his winter feeding-ground. It is 
time that the general government should take the 
necessary steps to supply this noble game with food 
when nature's supply is inadequate or out of reach. 

The mountain lions and bear have increased to an 
undesirable extent, and last winter a number of the 
more troublesome bears were killed, as well as thirty 
mountain lions. This action became necessary to 
relieve campers of the annoyances caused by too 
familiar bears, and as a measure for game protection. 
The howl of the small wolf or coyote is often heard 
toward morning. Among the smaller animals that 
interest and amuse tourists are the gopher, squirrel, 
ground-hog, badger, chipmunk, jack-rabbit and beaver. 
The work of the beaver can be often seen along 
creeks in the shape of dams, huts and tree-cuttings. 



76 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

A short distance below West Thumb we had the some- 
what unusual opportunity to see a large beaver close 
to the road doing day-work. This otherwise very shy 
animal was not in the least disturbed by our presence, 
and we left him as we found him, hard at work in 
repairing a defective dam. Among the aquatic birds 
we saw swans, geese, ducks, white pelicans, herons 
and plovers. The birds of prey are represented by the 
eagle, owl and different kinds of hawks. Ravens, black- 
birds, robins, blue jays and the so-called camp-robber 
are some of the birds most frequently seen. Several 
varieties of grouse inhabit the mountains, but seldom 
come near enough the line of travel to be seen. The 
mosquito, gnat and horsefly are very troublesome to 
man and beast, especially on the shores of lakes, along 
water courses and in marshy places. The naturalist 
will find the Yellowstone Park an exceedingly inter- 
esting place to study the form, color and habits of the 
wild animals, as most of them have become habitu- 
ated to the presence of man and can be observed at 
close range. The amateur photographer will have 
here an opportunity to secure pictures which it would 
be impossible to take anywhere else. The hunter and 
artist will enter here a school of instruction replete 
with the most interesting object-lessons in animal life. 
Children can receive here a part of their education in 
this great kindergarten of nature which can not be 
obtained in any school-room. 

THE FLORA. 

"Flowers worthy of paradise." 

—Milton. 

During the early part of summer the whole Park is 
a veritable flower garden. The plateau prairies, the 




ON THE LOOKuaT. 



THE FLORA 77 

woodland meadows, the mountain sides, the forest, 
the river banks and the shores of the alpine lakes 
all are strewn with flowers of every hue. The flora of 
the Yellowstone Park is almost a duplicate of that of 
the Transbaikal Mountains in Siberia. The reasons 
for this are quite apparent, as both of these localities 
have much in common in altitude, climate, soil and 
water supply. Considering the high elevation even 
of the lowest valleys of the Yellowstone Park, the 
flora is remarkable for its great variety and exquisite 
beauty. The visitor from the East will find many 
flowers familiar to him, but many of them in an 
entirely new dress. Some of our old acquaintances 
impress us here with their giant size, others we find 
dwarfed, and most of them have assumed brighter and 
more lovely colors. It would seem that the soil, the 
pure mountain air and water constitute a combination 
of influences which nature utilizes in painting the 
flowers with a richness of tint almost unknown at or 
near the level of the sea. It seems that here, as 
elsewhere, the hard struggle for existence brings about 
results proportionate to the intensity of the effort. In 
southern climes, with a rich alluvial soil and under the 
influence of a tropical sun, the plants and flowers 
grow luxuriantly, everything being conducive to their 
growth and life, constantly 

"Indulging in the inglorious ease." 

— Virgilius. 

The results of such a life of leisure are usually ten- 
der, succulent, overgrown plants with little resistance 
to outward hostile influences, and showy, gorgeous 
flowers which, however, lack the variety and delicacy 



78 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

of tints that appeal so strongly to the sense of beauty. 
The hardy plants of the subalpine regions do not lead 
a life of ease and luxury. From the moment the spark 
of life is awakened in the seed the struggle begins. 
What has to be accomplished must be done quickly. 
They have no perennial summer sun to lull them into 
an unconscious, dreamy life of indolence and luxury. 
They have no gentle spring during v^^hich to enjoy the 
childhood days and by slow progression reach maturity. 
They are aroused and suddenly started into an active 
existence by the stimulating rays of the summer sun, 
and in less than four months all hope of further activ- 
ity is banished by the untimely appearance of an arctic 
winter which holds plant-life in its icy grasp the bal- 
ance of the year. The two most beautiful seasons of 
the year for all kinds of vegetation — spring and fall — 
are almost unknown to the flowers of Yellowstone Park. 
Birth and death are equally sudden, separated b}^ a 
short but exceedingly active and useful life. The annual 
plant has only one-third of the year in which to grow, 
blossom and produce seed. In many instances it has 
to depend on a scanty soil for its nourishment; it must 
contend with frost, drouth and chilly nights, and must 
bear the scorching rays of the midday sun. The 
hardy plants of this great national park exhibit the 
effects of toil. Their framework is firm, their paren- 
chyma compact, their very leaves and roots show a 
degree of hardiness unknown in plants inhabiting a 
more congenial climate and with more favorable 
environments. Their diligence, perseverance and 
self-denial, however, are rewarded by a full measure 
of success. They are in the Park for a purpose. 
Their sole object in life is to delight the eye of the 




ELK NEAR YELLOWSTONE LAKE. 



THE FLORA 79 

tourist. They make their appearance as soon as the 
blanket of snow is removed, and many of them are 
buried alive under the late September snow. During 
this short summer the flowering plants decorate the 
Park with a variety of flowers never to be found in a 
tropical forest or mesa. The pale green carpet of 
soft grass is spangled with flowers of all hues, some of 
them nestled in the grass, some of them peeping 
through the green background, still others towering 
high above the sward. In painting these flowers 
nature has employed the most skillful artists. Flow- 
ers, which in lower regions have but one color, appear 
here in the greatest variety of tints. All possible 
shades of the primary colors can be seen here. To 
one who has studied the flora of the Yellowstone Park 
will occur the lines: 

"To gild refined gold, to paint the lily, 
To throw perfume on the violet, 
To smooth the ice, or add another hue 
Unto the rainbow, or with the taper-light 
To seek the beauteous eye of heaven to garnish, 
Is wasteful and ridiculous excess." 

— Shakespeare. 

It would be impossible, after a short sojourn of 
eleven days in the Park, to give a detailed description 
of its interesting and magnificent flora. It would 
require the earnest labor of an expert botanist for 
years to do this subject justice. I will undertake to 
call attention to only a very few of the most beautiful 
flowers which are well calculated to attract the atten- 
tion of the tourist on his way through the Park. It 
would not be an easy matter to decide upon the com- 
parative merits of the many queens of the meadows, 



80 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

prairies and forests in the Park. This task would be 
as fruitless and thankless as the award of prizes in a 
beauty show. It would require a jury of impartial 
and expert botanists to arrive at anything like a just 
decision in classifying the flowers here in reference to 
their claims for beauty. Such an effort would be one 
largely dependent upon individual taste. The 
admirer of blue would select a flower of that color, 
another partial to a more lively color would give pref- 
erence to one of the many varieties of red flowers, 
while still another would award the first place to one 
presenting one of the endless tints of yellow. The 
beauty of a flower does not depend exclusively on the 
coloring of its petals; its shape, demeanor and the 
foliage of the plant contribute much in adding to or 
detracting from its beauty. 

A FEW OF THE QUEENS OF THE YELLOWSTONE PARK 

FLORA. 

Larkspur (Delphinium triorne). This flower 
deserves prominent mention, perhaps less owing to its 
attractiveness than its omnipresence, not only in the 
Park, but all over the mountains and sandy plains of 
the Rocky Mountain states. The long raceme of 
pretty blue flowers and the dark green, alternate, 
three or five palmately divided leaves attract the 
herbivorous animals, and where grass is scanty the 
plant is a most welcome food for cattle and horses. 
The root of this plant is poisonous, and on this account 
the plant has received the unenviable name of stag- 
gerweed. Many cattle in the west die annually, espe- 
cially during the early spring months. At this time the 
root which contains the poison is pulled out of the 



A FEW QUEENS OP THE PARK PLORA 81 

soft ground and is eaten with the plant. Horses cut 
the plant even with the ground with their teeth, and 
consequently escape the danger of poisoning. This 
plant is not particular as to location. It is found as 
high as the tree limit and grows luxuriously on the 
moist river banks as well as on the arid plains. In color 
the flowers vary from a dark blue to nearly white. 
The deep blue color of the flower is a reliable indica- 
tion of the vigorous growth of the plant. 

Wild Cranes bill (Geranium maculatum). The 
wild geranium grows in profusion throughout the 
entire Park, and judging from the gigantic size which 
it attains in many localities, it appears to have found 
here a congenial soil and surroundings. The corolla 
of five rounded petals varies in color from a purplish 
pink to nearly white. The delicate streaks of dark 
purple color add much to the beauty of the flower. 
The large, hairy leaves are palmately, somewhat 
unequally, three, five or seven, divided. The large 
root is strongly astringent and is used quite extensively 
in the treatment of diarrhoeal affections. In appear- 
ance it compares favorably with its garden relatives. 

Moss-piitk (Phlox subulata). The color of the 
moss-pink found in the Park and on the arid plains of 
Wyoming is a pure white. The plant grows in small 
bunches, the short stems prostrate rising slightly from 
the ground. The little snow-white flowers with five 
obovate lobes notched at the apex on pedicels are 
arranged in terminal racemes. The exquisite beauty 
of this little flower shows to greatest advantage when 
it decorates the cracked, arid soil upon which it seems 
to prosper best. It is very strange that when it is 
severed from the inhospitable dry soil its petals wilt 



82 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

and shrivel at once, so that no time should be lost in 
placing it in the botanical press if it is to be preserved 
for the herbarium. 

Blue Flag (Iris versicolor). This is the fleur-de-lis 
so familiar to the frequenters of mill-ponds and 
marshy places. The subalpine blue flag prefers a dry 
soil. It resembles its eastern sisters in every respect 
as far as size, structure of leaves and flowers are con- 
cerned, but has taken here a new garb, as the flower 
is of a white color slightly tinged with yellow. 

Pointed Blue-eyed Grass (Sisyrinchium angustifol- 
ium). The iris family has another beautiful little 
repi;*esentative in the Park, the blue-eyed grass. The 
leaves are linear, grass-like, and the solitary sky-blue 
flower grows from a pair of green bracts. It is a modest 
little flower that is fond of burying itself in the taller 
grass. It dislikes to be incorporated in a bouquet, as 
it shrivels almost immediately after it is severed from 
the stem. 

Shooting-star (Dodecatheon meodia frigida). It 
would be difficult to find a more beautiful flower than 
the shooting-star, if the flower is given the thoughtful 
attention it deserves. It makes no pretensions, no 
display. It is fond of company, as it grows in a ter- 
minal umbel in groups of two to twenty. It bends its 
shapely head modestly and turns its lovely little face 
toward the handsome obovate to lanceolate leaves 
beneath. The five parted calyx and lilac or pink 
corolla are strongly reflexed. The five stamens embrace 
the single pistil, forming a shapely cone. The rich 
cinnamon fragrance is as pleasing to the sense of smell 
as the beauty of the flower is to the eye. 

Hairy Willow Herb (Epilobium hirsutum). The 



A FEW QUEENS OF THE PARK FLORA 83 

leaves of this plant resemble in shape and color those 
of the willows, differing from them, however, in that 
they are hairy. It usually inhabits moist meadows, 
but in the Park it is satisfied with the moisture it 
receives in the vicinity of brooks, springs and rivulets. 
The small, rosy pink, nodding flowers grow in termi- 
nal corymbs. 

Blue Cardinal Flower (Lobelia syphilitica). This 
is one of the most showy flowers in the Park. It is a 
tall, erect flower with a very bold, proud bearing. It 
claims attention wherever it grows by its size and 
handsome, two-lipped, tubular flowers arranged in a 
leafy panicle. 

Monk' s-hood (Aconitum uncinatum). Poison lurks 
behind this attractive flower. It charms by its beauty 
and kills or sickens by the paralyzing juices contained 
in its dark green, three to five lobed, petioled leaves and 
tuberous root. I found this flower in greatest abun- 
dance in the Grand Canyon region. The bluish purple, 
very irregular flower is conspicuous for its unsymmet- 
rical structure. The calyx of five sepals is strangely 
fashioned like a monk's hood. The helmet, one and 
a half inches long, is broad and wide with turned- 
down visor. The corolla is made up of two small 
petals that look like chin tabs. In its general aspects 
and poisonous properties it has much in common with 
its near neighbor, the larkspur, for which it might be 
mistaken by a superficial observer; the flower of the 
former, however, is, as a rule, of a much deeper blue. 

Fringed Gentiajt (Gentiana crinata). The bril- 
liant blue fringed gentian seems to have a special pre- 
dilection for the geyser basins, as it is found in great 
abundance in all of them, and very often in dangerous 



84 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

proximity to the spouting geysers and boiling, steam- 
ing, bubbling hot wells. The blue fringed gentian is 
a striking beauty. The funnel-shaped, terminal, soli- 
tary, deep blue flower lifts its head erect from a deli- 
cate stem one to two feet in height, resting in the 
green cup of four pointed, unequal sepals. The four 
rounded lobes of the corolla are beautifully fringed at 
the edges. The leaves are sharply pointed, opposite 
lanceolate and clasping. The delicate fringe is a sug- 
gestion of fashion, and the soft green calyx, blending 
with its incomparable blue corolla, is an example of 
the most exquisite taste. When the sun retires the 
corolla folds its fringed borders and closes for the 
night as if to protect its interior against the chilly 
night air and to exclude the unwelcome dew. 

Long-spurred Columbine (Aquilegia coerulea). 
This variety of columbine is a native of the Rocky 
Mountains and is found in all parts of the Park where 
grass and other flowers grow. It is not as showy as 
the red and yellow aquilegia truncata found in the 
East, but its white or cream-colored petals possess a 
strong fascination for the eye. The terminal, solitary 
flowers nodding from thread-like pedicels are very 
images of purity and profound modesty. The corolla 
of five united, tubular, spurred petals are in exquisite 
harmony with the ovate, colored sepals with their 
slender, spreading spurs, double the length of those of 
the petals with which they alternate. This flower, 
with its red and yellow kin, would do honor to any 
flower garden. 

Swamp Rose (Rosa Carolina). The pink-faced, 
fragrant rose of the Rocky Mountains finds enough 
moisture in some of the well-watered places to rival its 



A FEW QUEENS OF THE PARK FLORA 85 

sisters in the swamps of the East in beauty and fra- 
grance. The five soft, delicate, crimson pink petals 
expand boldly from the narrow confines of the tubular, 
five-clefted, green calyx. The numerous stamens and 
pistils decorate the interior of the flower in a most 
artistic and becoming manner. The soft, green leaves 
of odd, pinnate, three to nine serrated leaflets, with a 
paler under surface, impart a peculiar charm to this 
as well as all others of this family of flowers. Like all 
other roses, the swamp rose has its liberal supply of 
recurved prickles projecting unpleasantly above the 
surface of the erect and otherwise smooth stem. 

Painted Cup, or Indian Pink (Castilleja coccinea). 
This flower is at its best in the Park. To any one who 
has seen it at a low altitude, it is a surprise here, shin- 
ing, as it does, like a flame of fire from the green grass 
from which it projects to a commanding height. In 
many places it is numerous and of such giant size and 
the whorl of floral leaves so gaudily painted, that it 
buries the grass and smaller flowers under a flaming 
sheet of vermilion red. The Indian pink is the 
haughtiest and most presuming flower in the Park. It 
hides its homely face in a mask of coarsely-painted 
whorl of floral leaves. It palms off this gaudy mask 
to the superficial observer and ignorant as its own face. 
Tear away this deceptive cover borrowed from the 
leaves and you expose a very homely, irregular, scent- 
less flower. The three bract-like, vermilion lobes near 
the flower induced Bryant to write: 

"Now, if thou art a poet, tell me not 
That these bright chalices were tinted thus 
To hold the dew for fairies, when they meet 
On moonlight evenings in the hazel bowers, 
And dance till they are thirsty." 



86 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

Wild Sunflower (Helianthus giganteus). This 
familiar yellow composite flower is well represented 
in many places in the Park. Although a coarse plant, 
its large sulphur yellow flowers at the end of the 
upright, branched, leafy, rough stem present a pleas- 
ing picture in the shady woods and sunny meadows. 
The large receptacle is crowded with ray and disk 
flowers of the same color, and inclosed by an involucre 
of two series of bract-like, pointed leaves. In some 
localities this flower is so abundant that it hides the 
smaller flowers and grass under a cover of its large, 
towering, gold yellow flowers. 

Cone flower (Rudbeckia hirta). This flower is 
readily distinguished from the ordinary sunflower by 
the central cone or disc of a chocolate brown color of 
disc flowers. The ray flowers, often nearly two inches 
in length, are pointed, spreading and of a deep yellow 
color. The pale green leaves are lanceolate, narrow, 
rough and disagreeable to the touch; the lower ones 
petioled, the upper ones sessile. The branching stem 
is from one to two feet in height. The flower com- 
memorates the name of the famous Swedish botanist, 
Rudbeck. 

Common Harebell (Campanula rotundifolia). The 
harebell is one of the gems of the flora of the Park. 
Its little sky-blue flowers at the end of slender, droop- 
ing stalks meet the eye everywhere. The bell-shaped, 
five-lobed corolla is embraced at its narrow base by a 
tubular calyx with five narrow, spiked lobes. The 
ground leaves are rounded or heart-shaped, and are 
supported by a slender petiole. The stem leaves are 
almost linear, few and scattered. The single pistil pro- 
trudes from the five stamens which surround it like a 
miniature clapper. 



A FEW QUEENS OF THE PARK FLORA 87 

Tall Bellflower (Campanula Americana). This 
light and dark blue beauty is one of the loveliest 
flowers of the forest and meadows in the Park. The 
flowers, arranged in a dense, long spike, are so vigorous 
and fresh as to rivet the attention of the tourist at 
once, and this charm continues as long as they remain 
in sight. The corolla of five pointed petals is almost 
wheel shaped. The long, curved pistil projects far 
beyond the five stamens. The plant, with alternate, 
lanceolate, finely-toothed leaves, rises to a height of 
from one to five feet; the average height of the stem 
does not exceed two feet, while in the East, in more 
fertile soil and under more congenial climatic influ- 
ences, it not infrequently aspires to the height of six 
feet. 

I have given the names and a brief description of 
only a very few of the beauties of the Park flora as an 
indication of the wealth of the floral kingdom in this 
part of the world, exposed to the rigors of a long and 
unusually severe winter. Every visitor will look with 
astonishment and admiration upon the floral exhibit 
and wonder at how much nature can accomplish in such 
a short space of time and under such adverse circum- 
stances. Cattle and horses make no distinction 
between flowers and grass when they feed lazily in the 
rich meadows and prairies around the Park, and it does 
seem like sacrilege to see them shear off the lovely 
flowers and mix them with the common grass in the 
living mowing-machine and the hungry stomach. Hay 
made in these localities is largely flower hay perfumed 
by the fragrance of the greatest variety of the most 
beautiful flowers which, in common with the coarse 
grass, the legitimate food for beasts of burden, sue- 



88 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

cumb to the deadly sickle of the mower, and with it 
are stored up for winter supply. The hay of eastern 
meadows is a common article compared with the prod- 
uct of the mountain meadows and prairies so strongly 
impregnated with fragrant flowers and aromatic herbs. 

A SIDE TRIP TO JACKSON HOLE. 

Jackson Hole is a large upland valley, thirty miles 
long and eight to ten miles wide, enclosed by high 
mountain ranges with towering peaks. This magnifi- 
cent mountain valley is watered by the Snake River, 
which, on its entrance into it, expands into Jackson 
Lake, the most picturesque alpine lake in the world. 
Before Jackson Hole was known to the outside world, 
it served as a hiding-place for a desperate band of 
horse thieves headed by a man by the name of 
Jackson. From this secluded retreat excursions were 
made in all directions in search of booty, which, when 
secured, found in this mountain retreat the best of 
pasturage and security against molestation from with- 
out. 

This gang of robbers and outlaws was finally cap- 
tured, and its chief was imprisoned for a long term. 
Since that time Jackson Hole has won a national repu- 
tation as being the best hunting ground for large 
game — bear, mountain lions, deer and, more espe- 
cially, elk. During the open season hundreds of hunt- 
ers have annually enjoyed their sport here and have 
returned after a stay of one to six weeks with the 
expected trophies of their chase. The rich valley is 
now under cultivation, principally by men who for- 
merly made a living by hunting and trapping, who 
have taken claims and now devote themselves largely 



A SIDE TRIP TO JACKSON HOLE 89 

to the raising of cattle. For those who are under the 
impression, as I was, that Jackson Hole is a wilderness, 
I will say that it is inhabited by nearly two hundred 
peaceable, orderly, hard-working citizens, with their 
families; that it has four school-houses, several hotels 
and general stores, and a Mormon meeting-house. 
These people are well posted on what is going on 
beyond the mountain ranges, as they are liberal 
patrons of newspapers and the best magazines pub- 
lished in this country and abroad. Albert Nelson is 
one of the most prominent inhabitants of this secluded 
spot in the Rocky Mountains. He is a Swede, a taxi- 
dermist by trade, and a much-sought-for guide during 
the hunting season. He is a man of more than aver- 
age intelligence, happily married to a mountain girl, 
and owner of a promising ranch. A good military 
road connects West Thumb with Jackson Lake. The 
southern boundary of the Park is about half-way 
between these two points; the whole distance, forty- 
eight miles. On leaving the Park, the last military 
station is passed, and the remaining journey leads 
through the timber reservation. Near the outlet of 
Jackson Lake is a small hotel owned and managed by 
Mr. Allen, who also keeps a small general store. 

Jackson Lake is a charming alpine lake, ten miles 
long and on an average two and one-half miles wide, 
dotted by several little islands, favorite breeding 
places for a variety of water fowl. The background 
of the lake is the Teton Mountain range, with the 
Grand Teton and Moran Peaks as leading landmarks, 
which can be distinctly seen in several directions at a 
distance of lOO miles. The Grand Teton is the 
higher of the two, its bare gray peak having an eleva- 



90 YELLOWSTONE PARK 

tion of over 14,000 feet above the level of the sea. 
Each one of the peaks has a glacier of considerable 
size, ending belov^ in an immense abrupt wall of ice. 
The w^hole mountain range is flecked vv^ith perennial 
snov^, and up to the tree-line is heavily timbered with 
pine. The foot of the mountain forms the west bank 
of the lake. From the east bank the ascent to a 
lower and broken range of mountains is more gradual. 
This beautiful sheet of water is merely a deepened and 
widened bed of the most crooked flowing body of 
water in the world — Snake River. The water is clear 
as crystal, ice cold and teems with several varieties 
of trout and land-locked salmon. The average weight 
of the trout caught is about two and one-half pounds, 
and the yield to a skillfully handled rod from two to 
three per hour. A small naphtha launch at the upper 
end of the lake is at the disposal of fishermen. The 
quality of the fish caught in this lake is excellent. 
This part of the timber reserve has been intended by 
nature as an essential addition to Yellowstone Bark. 
\ Nowhere in the Park is the mountain scenery so grand, 
land Jackson Lake, if anything, is more beautiful than 
'/ Yellowstone Lake. No time should be lost in extend- 
I ing the Park in this direction so as to include the 
I entire range of the Teton Mountains, Jackson Lake 
and the upper part of Jackson Hole, the winter camp 
for the elk. Jackson Lake is the most desirable place 
for a large modern hotel for tourists. The trip from 
West Thumb to this station could be made with ease 
and comfort in one day. This extension would 
lengthen the tour through the Park by two days, but 
would add many new and most interesting attractions. 
The landscapes along the extended route are superb 



A SIDE TRIP TO JACKSON HOLE 91 

and the trip would terminate by unfolding to the vis- 
itor an alpine scenery, majestic and beautiful beyond 
description, with a gem of a mountain lake in the 
foreground. With such an extension of the Park, and 
proper care of the hundreds of elk and deer who are 
driven into Jackson Hole by the deep snow and long 
and severe winter, the laudable efforts at game pro- 
tection would be complete. 

We left Jackson Hole by way of the Teton Pass, 
which reaches an elevation of 8,425 feet above sea 
level. It was on this part of our trip that we 
passed through one of the grandest primeval for- 
ests of pines much larger than in the Park, and red 
spruce of enormous size, and the variety and beauty 
of the alpine flora surpassed anything we had 
seen and admired before. The road on both sides of 
the mountain is steep and rough, but the inconve- 
niences and hardships of the trip are more than bal- 
anced by the pleasures derived from the magnificent 
sceneries, the imposing forest and the great variety of 
lovely flowers. This pass should be included in the 
Park, and the road so improved as to furnish a new 
and easy avenue to and from the Park by way of the 
nearest railway station — St. Anthony. The distance 
from Jackson Lake to St. Anthony is ninety-five miles. 
From the pass to the station the road passes through a 
number of prosperous Mormon settlements. It is 
expected that the Oregon Short Line has in contem- 
plation the extension of the road to Jackson Hole, and 
if this is done, the entrance into the Park from that 
side would add much to the present facilities and 
would make this route a very popular one. 



THE TO SEMITE VALLEY 



TOSEMITE VALLEY 

Another public pleasure resort of which the people 
of the United States, and more especially the State 
of California, may well feel proud is the Yosemite 
Valley and the nearby Mariposa grove of big trees. 
The landscapes, sceneries and objects of interest are 
so different here from those in the Yellov/stone 
National Park, that a visit from one to the other is 
attended by more than the usual degree of pleasure 
and profit. The Sierra Mountains have charms and 
surprises unknown in the heart of the Rockies. The 
comparisons between these mountain fastnesses, 
unlocked by a generous and far-sighted government, 
are very striking. The Yellowstone Park is vast; the 
Yosemite, as compared with it, small. Although the 
altitudes of the valleys and mountains of the former 
are much greater than of the latter, the reverse 
appears to the tourist, owing to the compactness of its 
territories. It requires at least seven days to view the 
varying sights of the Yellowstone Park, while from 
Inspiration Point, at the entrance to the Yosemite, 
nearly every point of interest it presents can be seen 
without a change of position. The spouting geysers, 
boiling springs, hot rivers and Grand Canyon inspire 
one with awe and a keen sense of fear; the Yosemite 
Valley is a peaceful, quiet mountain enclosure through 
which flows the sleepy, crystal, clear water of the 
Merced. The roaring and thundering of the Yellow- 
stone Falls is in strong contrast with the whisperings 
of the Bridal Veil and the Yosemite Falls. In the 
Yellowstone Park the visitors have to look down to 

see its most notable attractions; in the Yosemite the 

95 



% YOSEMITE VALLEY 

eyes must be turned in the opposite direction to behold 
its grandest beauties. The Yellowstone Lake is one 
of the most charming of all mountain lakes; Mirror 
Lake, beautiful and enchanting as it is, is but a small 
pool created by a widening of the bed of the Merced 
River. Yosemite is inhabited by very few wild ani- 
mals; the Yellowstone Park is a great game preserve, 
where the visitor will never be disappointed in seeing 
bear, elk and deer. The greatest difference in the two 
national picnic grounds is, however, to be found in the 
character of the forest. The forest of the Yellow- 
stone Park is vast, but somewhat monotonous; the 
forest of the Yosemite and the country around it is 
noted for the great variety and the gigantic size of 
some of its trees. The Mariposa grove of big trees is 
something that can be seen nowhere else. Nature has 
expended here all her forces to demonstrate what she 
can accomplish in the way of tree growth. She has 
been busily engaged in this work for thousands of 
years to illustrate what she can do in the way of build- 
ing monster trees. Other parts of the world have 
big trees, but none of them can compare with what is 
exhibited here. We have many things to which the 
superlative adjectives fitly apply, but here we find 
something in the way of tree growth that is absolutely 
incomparable. If Yosemite and Mariposa had nothing 
else to show except their wonderful trees, they would 
be famous places well worth seeing by visitors from 
all parts of the world. The Yellowstone Park has 
exhibits of nature's fearful forces and exquisite prod- 
ucts of art; the Yosemite illustrates the style of her 
rough architecture and the boundless resources of her 
vegetable kingdom. Undoubtedly when this mountain 



SAN FRANCISCO TO THE YOSEMITE 97 

valley was excavated out of the solid granite rock, it 
was the scene of mighty convulsive movements that 
made the mountains tremble and their sides echo and 
re-echo with a voice of thunder. It is quiet and 
peaceful now. We were reminded the first evening 
after our arrival of what occurred here perhaps thou- 
sands of years ago, when we were made to experience 
the impressions of quite a severe shock of earthquake. 
The shock came at 11:55 p. m. and lasted for twelve 
seconds. The first sensation was one of a falling away 
of the floor underneath the feet, followed by a corres- 
ponding rise, and then came the rocking movements. 
The sensations experienced were very much the same 
as felt on a ship during a squall. In contemplating the 
wonders of both of these national parks, one can not 
resist the thought: 

"All are but part of one stupendous whole, 
Whose body Nature is, and God the soul." 

—Pope. 

FROM SAN FRANCISCO TO THE YOSEMITE. 

The Yosemite is reached by one of two routes, 
either by the way of the Southern Pacific or Santa F6 
road, the former being the one most frequently 
selected. Its terminus is Raymond, about 200 miles 
from San Francisco and seventy-one miles from Yose- 
mite. 

We left San Francisco at 9:10 p. m. and boarded 
the sleeper at Oakland, from where the train departed 
at 11:25 the same evening, and arrived at Raymond at 
six the next morning. Arrangements have been 
recently made to reach Yosemite the same day by the 
inauguration of a limited stage service. The limited 



98 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

stage carries the mail and makes the trip of seventy- 
one miles over one of the roughest of rough roads in 
twelve hours. After a hasty breakfast, the passengers 
mount the four-horse, open stage coach at Raymond, 
and the wild ride began in earnest. We left at 6:45 
a. m. and were landed in front of the Sentinel Hotel, 
Yosemite Valley, at 7:15 p. m. At Wawona a stop 
of thirty minutes was made for lunch, and about half 
of this time was spent in vain attempts to part with 
the dust that had been deposited upon and in our 
clothing and had masked the faces almost beyond 
recognition. The Yosemite Stage and Turnpike Com- 
pany, in their advertisements, make the prospective 
patrons understand that they will enjoy the luxury of 
traveling over an "oiled, dustless road." The tourist 
will have a better understanding of the meaning of 
these attractive descriptive terms before he leaves the 
dust-laden stage. It is true, the first thirty miles of the 
road have been oiled at great expense, $300 per mile, 
but it is by no means dustless. The balance of the 
road is either a good sample of stone corduroy or cov- 
ered with several inches of yellowish red dust, or both. 
The trip is a very trying one, as the horses are kept at 
full trot, and sometimes at a gallop, except when 
ascending steep grades. The entire road is one of the 
roughest and certainly the most crooked of all public 
highways. A limber back and a knack of balancing 
are necessary in order to occupy the same seat. 
Often in descending a steep grade, the many sharp 
turns and stone-paved road, the compact, stout vehicle 
rocks like a ship in a storm, and the knocks and jolts 
the passengers receive try the most steady and cour- 
ageous nerves. In the wild descents, the wheel track 



SAN FRANCISCO TO THE YOSEMITE 99 

on the dangerous side is often not more than a couple 
of feet from the margin of an awful precipitous 
decline. The breaking of a wheel or axle, the giving 
way of the roadbed or miscalculation on part of the 
driver in such dangerous places would mean almost 
certain death. Serious accidents are only avoided by 
the unusual skill of the experienced drivers, the well- 
trained, gentle horses and the use of coaches built 
specially for such hazardous usage. A person 
advanced in years or in impaired health should avoid 
the limited stage, and make the trip in two days 
instead of one, stopping at Wawona for the first night. 
There is probably no other place on earth where stage 
passengers are more annoyed with dust than in going 
over the last forty-one miles of the "dustless road." 
The clouds of dust are often so dense that the suffering 
occupants of the stage could not distinguish anything 
beyond them, even if their unprotected eyes should be 
in a condition to functionate properly. A duster is of 
questionable utility, as the fine dust in the form of an 
impalpable yellowish red powder will find its way 
through the clothing until, in the course of time, 
further penetration is arrested by the dust-proof skin. 
Eyes, mouth, nose and ears are its favorite lodging- 
places. It finds entrance through every crevice of the 
hand baggage, and ruins articles which are supposed 
to be safe from this aggressive and unpleasant 
intruder. The eyes, nose and throat soon become 
painfully aware of the constant irritation due to the 
presence of this foreign substance, and sneezing, 
hawking and coughing add to the distress of the exist- 
ing sense of suffocation. 

I presume many a passenger on this unsteady, vio- 



100 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

lent mountain ship, after leaving the oiled part of the 
road, has been tempted to go no farther, but the very 
thought of a succession of scenic treats so near by 
and for which he had been longing for years, urged 
him on and enabled him to collect courage to face the 
worst. Indeed, the expectancy of a realization of such 
a long-felt desire is a source of great consolation under 
such trying experiences. The dust-laden traveler must 
remember that everything that is easily obtained has 
but little value. The tourist who climbs the Pilatus 
or Righi by rail does not experience the same exquisite 
pleasure in looking at the grand panorama around and 
below him as the one who walks and spends a whole 
night in ascending these famous mountain peaks. If 
diamonds and the precious metals were not hid away 
in the depths of their rocky beds, so difficult of access 
to the greedy grasp of man, they would not represent 
the intrinsic value they do. To be given an oppor- 
tunity to see the grandeur and beauty of the Yosemite 
Valley and the magnificent forests which have guarded 
it for thousands of years, is worth an effort, for 

"Life is accustomed to give nothing to man 
without a world of toil." — Horatius. 

The tired-out stage passenger, when free from dust 
and comfortably quartered at the Sentinel Hotel, will 
soon forget the wild and dusty ride when he is face to 
face with some of the most remarkable handiworks of 
nature. From the veranda next morning he will see 
the sun rise over the towering Half Dome, the rays 
reflected on the opposite side of the valley by the 
silvery Yosemite Falls, leaping over the walls of the 
peak of the same name, and looking down almost 
beneath his feet, he sees the ripples of the crystal, 



RAYMOND TO YOSEMITE 101 

Clearwater of the Merced, and in the calm current the 
trout busily engaged in their search for living food 
with which to satisfy their sense of hunger. As the 
rays of the sun strike the large, cool dew drops cling- 
ing to the emerald green foliage in the valley, millions 
of purest gems appear as by magic to vanish as myste- 
riously as they came, when the pearls are kissed away 
by the more amorous rays of the ascending sun. It 
is now that the rested traveler is in a proper mood to 
appreciate that 

"Toil and pleasure, in their natures opposite, 
are yet linked together in a kind of necessary , 
connection." — Livius. 

The whole trip from Raymond to this wonderful 
valley is a preparatory one, and culminates when 
Inspiration Point is reached. The road passes over 
the foothills of the Sierras, and after it has penetrated 
into the heart of the mountains, many of the bare 
peaks above the tree-line come into view. The hills 
grow higher and higher, the valleys wider and deeper, 
the scattered boulders bigger, the forest denser, and 
the trees progressively larger, as the point of destina- 
tion draws nearer. For a distance of thirty-five miles 
the trees are scattered and stunted, the short grass 
yellow and dead, the flowers faded, the springs dry, a 
picture reverse to that of early spring, 

"When spring unlocks the flowers to paint 
the laughing soil." — Heber. 

We were too late to see the open mountain prairies 
in bloom; we made the trip too late to see the flowers 
that announce and accompany the season of the year 
when nature is at her best. We were in the midst of 



102 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

the saison mort of this part of the Pacific slope. We 
simply saw the remnants of the beauties of spring, 
only here and there a straggling flower, as most of 
the vegetation had yielded to the irrepressible demands 
of the summer's drouth. The earth was parched and 
cracked, thirsting for rain. Little patches of green 
in the deeper ravines and on the mountain sides 
marked the places of starving springs. The trees we 
met here were the hardy nut-pine, with its silver gray 
foliage and large cones ripening the delicious little 
nuts; the white oak, short and stout, with its long, 
strong rectangular arms outstretched, and its enor- 
mous, greedy roots abstracting moisture and food from 
far and near without any regard for the needs of its 
nearest neighbors; the black oak and the live oak, 
both of these trees showing only too plainly by their 
small size and rickety shapes what they had to con- 
tend with in abstracting from the scanty, arid soil the 
necessary sustenance to maintain life. 

The variety of shrubs along the entire route is con- 
fusing. Among these the most conspicuous are the 
manzanita, with its crooked trunk and equally tortuous 
branches wrapped in a smooth bark of copper color, 
and its broadly ovate, compact, smooth, silvery 
leaves, and the buckeye, with its white, smooth coat 
of bark and large pinnatifid leaves fading into yellow 
and red, suggestive of the approach of premature 
death. Another shrub worthy of a more than passing 
notice is the mountain mahogany (Cercocarpus parvi- 
folius). This shrub is from two to twenty feet high, 
branching from a thick base. The leaves are alter- 
nate, short petioled, cuneate, serrate across the sum- 
mit, silky above and hoary beneath, from six to 



TREES OF THE SIERRAS 103 

eight inches long. The shrub is easily recognized by 
its wedge-shaped, willow-green leaves, prominently 
veined and notched at the summit. Its wood is the 
heaviest and hardest found in California. Another 
shrub on this route, from eight to twelve feet high, 
apparently leafless, yet in season covered with bright 
yellow blossoms of great beauty, is the leatherwood 
(Frementia Californica). Two shrubs, which possess 
valuable medicinal properties, found in abundance all 
over the foothills, are the yerba santa (Eriodictyon 
glutinosum) and the cascara sagrada. The yerba 
santa, the sacred herb of the Indians, evidently enjoys 
an arid soil, as shown by the freshness of its dark 
green, long, narrow, net-veined, serrated leaves. 
The upper surface of the leaf is shiny and smooth, as 
though it had been varnished; the lower surface is a 
paler green. The cascara sagrada, California coffee 
(rhamnus Californica), is a shrub four to eighteen 
feet high with alternate, elliptic to oblong, denticulate 
or entire, leathery leaves, narrow and one to four 
inches long. The medicinal properties reside in the 
bark. From it is obtained a laxative remedy which has 
gained a well-deserved reputation at home as well as 
abroad. 

After passing over the foothills, the nut-pine dis- 
appears and its place is taken by the long-leaf yel- 
low pine and the red and white cedar, all of them 
stately forest trees. These trees are first seen about 
thirty-five miles from Raymond. The largest of these 
trees reach a height of from 150 to 200 feet, and many 
of the massive trunks have a circumference of from 
twelve to twenty feet. The ambition of the young 
trees is to equal their seniors in height. Trees not 



104 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

more than a foot in diameter are often seen equal in 
height to the neighboring aged giants. As soon as an 
altitude of 4,000 feet is reached another pine, the 
sugar-pine (Pinus Lambertiana, DougL), joins the pine 
family. This is the acknowledged regal pine, the 
prince of the whole pine family, exceeded in size only 
by the immense sequoia. It grows cones from ten to 
twenty-six inches in length. The columnar, branch- 
less trunks often reach a height of 100 and more feet, 
bearing a light green, thickly set crown. The bark 
of the yellow pine is lighter than that of the sugar- 
pine, and is more coarsely checked. The bark of the 
cedar is brownish red and deeply corrugated in a ver- 
tical direction. All of these trees are remarkable for 
their healthy appearance, with the exception of those 
which from their location are subjected to starvation, 
and those affected with senile decay. Occasionally 
a tree is seen with a large tumor, but usually as a 
single, isolated affection. Some of these tumors are 
of enormous size, but seldom encircle the trunk. The 
tree most frequently afflicted with tumors is the white 
oak. This tree has another equally formidable enemy 
to encounter — the mistletoe. This parasite makes 
serious demands on its helpless, passive host. Many 
of the oaks are supporting a number of these parasites, 
which not infrequently attain the size of a beehive, 
draining the resources of the host until life is ex- 
hausted, when death to both is the inevitable conse- 
quence. The pine has its own mistletoe. It is not as 
aggressive and less dangerous parasite. It is much 
smaller, and seldom we find more than one on the 
same tree. 

With a light breakfast, and after a ride of forty- 




WASHINGTON COLUMN AND MIRROR LAKE. 



INSPIRA TION POINT 105 

five miles over a rough mountain road, we were glad 
to reach the lunch station, Wawona. Heat, dust, 
thirst and hunger made us understand what Shenstone 
said of an inn: 

'* Whoe'er has travell'd life's dull round, 
Where'er his stages may have been, 
May sigh to think he still has found 
The warmest welcome at an inn." 

The road from Wawona to the Yosemite is the 
roughest, but as it passes through a grand primeval 
forest, the traveler's attention is riveted continually 
on towering trees and new landscapes, which change 
with every turn of the road as it skirts the steep slopes 
of the valleys and canyons which follow each other in 
ceaseless succession. Now we look down a yawning 
chasm, now up a treeless, gray, somber peak, which 

"Risest from forth thy silent sea of pines." 

— Coleridge. 

As we finish the last climb, we look down a deep val- 
ley, from which the setting sun has already departed. 
The driver tightens the reins, and the sweating, pant- 
ing horses are only too willing to obey his silent 
order to halt. Pointing with his whip to a large sign, 
he informs us that we have reached 

INSPIRATION POINT. 

This is the point from which the Yosemite Valley 
is first seen by the traveler coming over the Wawona 
route. The beauty of the valley and the grandeur of 
its inclosing mountains and silvery waterfalls present 
at once a scenery which no pen can describe and no 
artist can reproduce. Deep down in the wide moun- 
tain gorge is the park-like valley, sleeping in the vast 



106 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

mountain solitude. We see the groups of stately 
trees, the green meadows, the heavily-timbered 
slopes, the silvery, dreaming Merced, the zigzag bridle 
path and the winding carriage roads, and as we lift 
our eyes, the almost perpendicular walls of granite, 
surmounted by domes and spires, cliffs, peaks and 
crags, from 3,000 to 5,000 feet in height, reflecting the 
rays of the setting sun. We see the sturdy El Cap- 
itan on the left, rising almost perpendicularly from 
the valley, its bald face furrowed by age; on the right 
the Cathedral Rocks, the Sentinel Dome and Glacier 
Point lift their majestic heads high up into the azure- 
blue evening sky, and in the distance, apparently 
beyond the opposite limits of the valley, the solemn, 
mighty form of the Half Dome comes into view, the 
crest of which rises 9,000 feet above the level of the 
sea. We could see from here the Bridal Veil Fall 
dashing over a perpendicular rock 900 feet high. It 
could not have received a more appropriate and 
deserving name. It plows down the rugged face of 
the mountain in a stream of white, fleecy foam, seem- 
ing to touch its rocky cheeks with a caress. The tur- 
bulent, silvery stream descends with a quick, rapid, 
gliding motion, now striking the rock, then leaping into 
the air with a movement of witching grace, seeming to 
laugh description to scorn. Artists have stood here 
and at the nearby Artist's Point, and have attempted 
to reproduce on canvas the grand panorama unfolded 
before the dazed eyes of the traveler as he stands on 
Inspiration Point, spellbound, bewitched by the 
grandeur and incomparable beauty of this favored spot 
in the heart of the Sierra Mountains. I am sure that 
the best pictures, when finished and compared with 




WIND P'LAYING WITH BRIDAL VEIL FALLS, QOO FEET. 



THE VALLEY 107 

nature's handiwork, must have been a source of keen 
disappointment to the artists themselves. There is a 
limitation to human skill in reproducing nature's 
works of art, and here is one of the many places 
where its imperfections must be most keenly felt. In 
this, as in so many other instances, we can not form a 
correct idea of nature's plastic and decorative art by 
looking through the eyes of the most skillful artist; 
the reality must be seen in order to be correctly under- 
stood and justly appreciated. With the slowly-grow- 
ing twilight, we descended the last steep mountain 
slope, entered the valley and arrived at the Sentinel 
Hotel, the only hotel in the valley, in time for a 
belated supper. 

THE VALLEY. 

This secluded mountain valley in the very heart of 
the Sierras was once the hiding-place of warfaring 
Indians. It was discovered by a company of volun- 
teers under command of Captain Doling in 185 1. A 
description of the scenic beauty of this wonderful 
gorge was first given by J. M. Hutchings in 1855, and 
published in the Mariposa Gazette the same year. 
Mr. Hutchings, a lover of nature, made it his home 
soon thereafter, until he died last year from the effects 
of injuries sustained during a runaway accident. In due 
time the state set it aside as a public pleasure-ground, 
in charge of a state board of commissioners. More 
recently the general government has added to it a 
timber reserve forty miles square. A number of 
groves of sequoia trees in its vicinity are also in safe- 
keeping by state and government legislation. The 
valley has an elevation of 4,000 feet, is seven miles in 



108 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

length, by from a half to one mile in width. It is 
excluded from the outside world by mountains from 
3, 5CXD to 6,000 feet in height, over which leap numer- 
ous waterfalls from 350 to 2,000 feet at a single bound 
— generous contributions to the lovely Merced River. 
This river, clear as crystal, a true mountain stream, 
100 feet wide, meanders lazily through the grass-car- 
peted meadows and between the stately trees of the 
valley. The forest in the valley is not dense; ample 
room is left between the majestic trees for the growth 
of shrubs, grass and flowers. The beautiful forest, 
the trout-stocked Merced, the lovely meadows, the 
winding roads, the fine hotel and cottages, the little 
brown church with its diminutive spire, the frowning 
cliffs, the tree-clad mountain sides and the charming, 
leaping waterfalls, make up a picture which no arti- 
ficial park can equal in grandeur and beauty. Among 
the trees in the valley and on the mountain sides we 
find the following: Yellow pine (Pinus ponderosa 
and Pinus Jeffreyi), sugar-pine (Pinus Lambertiana), 
tamarack-pine (Pinus contorta), red or incense cedar 
(Libocedrus decurrens), silver firs (Abies concolor, 
Abies grandis and Abies nobilis), black oak (Quercus 
Kelloggii), poplar (Populus balsamifera), alder (Alnus 
virides), quaking aspen (Populus tremuloides), live 
oak, dogwood (CornusNuttallii), soft maple and moun- 
tain laurel (Umbellularia Californica). 

A FEW OF THE BELATED FLOWERS. 

One of my greatest regrets in visiting this wonder- 
ful valley was that I was too late in the season to see, 
study and admire its floral beauty. May and June are 
the months to see the subalpine and alpine flora in 



"^Ii 



'^Z 





EL CAPITAN. 



A FEW OF THE BELATED FLOWERS 109 

their glory. I considered myself fortunate in finding 
two of the flowers that have contributed so much to 
the fame of this valley — the azalea and snowplant — 
although in a somewhat faded condition. 

Snowplant (Sarcodes sanguinea). This is the 
most beautiful and certainly the most famous flower of 
the Yosemite. It grows in the valley as well as on the 
summit and mountain slopes. The bright scarlet 
dress which it wears throughout imparts to it an unri- 
valed attraction and dignity, and distinguishes it at 
once from all other flowers of the same color. The 
stout stem is from six to eight inches high. In place 
of leaves the thick, fleshy, column-like, hairy stem is 
imbricated with bracts of a rosy tint. The scarlet 
flowers are short pediceled, with a corolla six lines 
long, campanulate and five-lobed. This gem of a 
flower despises an altitude of less than 4,000 feet, and 
its color is brightest and the stem most succulent when 
it has the privilege to grow at an elevation of from 
6,000 to 8,000 feet above the level of the sea. Its 
blood-red color is in strong contrast with the melting 
snow during the early months of spring. 

Californian Azalea (Rhododendron occidentale). 
This shrub, bearing beautiful snow-white and yellow 
flowers, is from two to twelve feet high, is very 
abundant, and is one of the spring attractions of the 
valley. When the shrub is in blossom, the spicy fra- 
grance emanating from its flowers lends an exquisite 
perfume to the pure, cool mountain air. At the time 
of my visit, I found the flowers wilted, a wreck of 
their former beauty. Attractive and charming as this 
shrub appears when decorated by a profusion of blos- 
soms, it is said its leaves and roots contain a powerful 



no YO SEMITE VALLEY 

narcotic poison. The flowers grow in large, showy 
clusters at the ends of the branches. The white 
corolla, resembling a honeysuckle in shape, has a fun- 
nel-form tube and five-cleft border, the upper lobe 
blotched with yellow and sometimes tinged with pink. 
Its base rests in the five-cleft, green calyx. The dark 
green obovate to lanceolate leaves, two to four inches 
long, are clustered with the flowers at the ends of the 
branches. 

Californian Dandelion (Troximon grandiflorum). 
Our dandelion, so common east of the Rocky Moun- 
tains and so widespread over the world, one of the 
earliest delights in the spring, and one that persists in 
blossoming until the icy winds of approaching winter 
suspend vegetable life, refuses to grow in the sunny 
climate of the Pacific slope. I have seen this flower 
on the North Cape, in Siberia and other remote places 
of the world, where vegetation has to make a deter- 
mined struggle for existence, but it has so far objected 
to the soil and climate of California, and will not 
mingle with its rich and varied flora. The dandelion 
is represented here by a different genus, which is quite 
as handsome, though the flowers are not so vivid a 
gold. It is of a paler color. The scape, surmounted 
by a single terminal flower, is from one to two feet 
high. In form and size the heads resemble our dande- 
lion very closely. The leaves are all radical, lanceo- 
late or oblanceolate. Scapes and leaves contain a 
bitter milky juice. In some varieties of Troximon the 
leaves are laciniately pinnatifid as in our genus. 

Evening Primrose (CEnothera biennis). The gor- 
geous, smiling, gold yellow primrose was the first 
flower to welcome us as we entered the Yosemite Val- 



A FEW OF THE BELATED FLOWERS 111 

ley. It was a familiar flower, but what a bright, 
cheerful face in this deep gorge, dimmed by the eve- 
ning twilight! The great salver-shaped corolla rivals 
in brilliancy the evening star sparkling in the over- 
hanging sky. The plant has a stout, hairy, usually 
single stem, woody below, stained a reddish hue, and 
punctated with minute red spots. The calyx is four- 
parted and reflexed in two pairs. The flowers are 
arranged in a leafy spike, the four stigma lobes linear, 
capsule an inch or less in length, hairy and strongly 
ribbed. 

Californian G o/denrod (Solidsigo Calif ornica). The 
goldenrods are not as abundant on the west side of the 
Rocky Mountains as in the east, and the varieties are 
fewer, but the flowers are perhaps more gorgeous in 
their dress of gold. The Californian goldenrod has a 
rather stout stem, varied in height, with alternate 
oblong, or the upper oblong-lanceolate, smooth leaves. 
The sulphur-yellow little heads, with seven to twelve 
small ray and as many disc flowers, are arranged in 
a dense pyramidal panicle from four to twelve inches 
long, with mostly erect, racemose branches. 

Wood Violet (Viola larmentosa). This modest 
little violet is found in great abundance in the moist, 
grassy woods on the banks of the Merced. The deli- 
cate, weak, creeping stems, the shapely, round, cordate, 
finely crenate leaves, and small, light yellow flowers, 
make a lovely decoration for the green carpet of grass. 

Californian Figwort (Scrophularia Calif ornica). 
This somewhat homely plant has a very wide distribu- 
tion, and in the Yosemite it is found at a high altitude 
in a somewhat crippled state, yet resembling very 
closely the more pretending Scrophularia nodosa so 



112 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

common in the middle states. The stem, round and 
smooth, does not exceed three feet in height. The 
leaves are opposite, the upper sessile, the lower with 
short petioles, oblong-ovate below, lanceolate above, 
and finely serrated. The little hood-like flower is of 
a dull red or greenish color, with a bilabiate corolla, 
the upper lip projecting and two lobed. The four 
stamens in two pairs project from the open corolla 
like the front teeth of some small rodent. 

Alpine Phlox (Phlox Douglasii). This charming 
little alpine plant seems to be almost independent of 
moisture and soil, as I found it in all its beauty 
attached to the bare rocks at the very summit of Yosem- 
ite Peak. It forms cushion-like tufts three to four 
inches high, with the delicate snow-white flowers only 
slightly raised above the green bed of hardy subulate 
leaves. The corolla is salver-shaped, with five-lobed 
border, stamens five inserted on the tube of the 
corolla, style three-lobed. Although this hardy plant 
thrives on the arid plains and on naked rocks, the deli- 
cate little flower withers almost the moment it is 
severed from the inhospitable host. 

Columbine (Aquilegia canadensis). The columbine 
found on the rocky heights of the Yosemite is a very 
small plant as compared with its relative in the east; 
the flower is the same. The spurred corolla is scarlet, 
tinged with yellow, quite in harmony with the similarly 
spurred petaloid sepals. The radical leaves are 
divided into thin, distant leaflets. 

Western Cardinal Flower (Lobelia splendens). 
The cardinal flower of the Yosemite cannot fail to 
attract the attention of the tourist. The cardinal red 
color of the tubular two-lipped corolla is so brilliant 




STAIRWAY ON CLOUD S REST TRAIL. 



A FEW OF THE BELATED FLOWERS 113 

and fiery that no other flower can excel it in the inten- 
sity of color. The flowers are arranged in an elon- 
gated wand-like raceme, terminating the smooth stem 
from one to two feet high. The leaves are alternate, 
mostly sessile, lanceolate or almost linear. 

St. Johnswort (Hypericum concumum). This 
variety of St. Johnswort I found on the mountain 
slopes and peaks of the Yosemite resembled the same 
genus elsewhere, only that the flower is small, not 
exceeding half an inch across. 

Spreading Dogbane (Apocynum androsaemifolium). 
This pretty little flower I found on the Yosemite Point 
among the immense boulders, supported by a dwarfed 
stem not more than six to twelve inches high. The 
opposite leaves are short petioled, ovate or roundish, 
an inch or two in length. The stem is much branched. 
The pink flowers grow in clusters of from three to ten 
and more. The corolla is campanulate with five retro- 
flexed lobes, stamens five inserted on the corolla, style 
sessile. The flesh tint of the shapely corolla is veined 
with deeper pink within. 

California Laurel (Umbellularia Calif ornica). The 
mountain slopes of the Yosemite Valley from base to 
summit are populated here and there by a stately 
shrub — the mountain laurel — the size of it being 
markedly influenced by the altitude. In other parts of 
this state this shrub under favorable influences devel- 
ops into a tree ten to lOO feet in height (State Uni- 
versity Park). I came too late to see this handsome 
shrub in blossom. It was already ripening its olive- 
like, oily fruit. The bark of the trunk and branches 
is white and smooth. The leaves are alternate, short 
petioled, lanceolate-oblong, two to four inches in 



114 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

length, dark green on the upper and a pale green on 
the under surface, strongly veined from a central mid- 
rib, containing an aromatic oil. The flowers are fra- 
grant. 

The Yosemite Valley is the cradle of some of the 
choicest flowers of California, and it was a source of 
keen regret that I missed so many that beautify it dur- 
ing the spring months, the real floral season of the 
year. I likewise missed many of the Compositae, which 
I presume in this locality are at their best after the 
fall rains revivify vegetation. A variety of asters were 
beginning to unfold their ray flowers, as well as 
Sonchus, sunflowers and the brown-eyed Rudbeckia. 

ASCENT OF YOSEMITE PEAK. 

The Yosemite Valley is so narrow, and the inclos- 
ing granite walls of such stupendous height, that the 
eyes have to be lifted in the study of its scenic 
beauties, the great rough walls appearing like a solid 
mass of granite, which on closer inspection is, how- 
ever, fissured vertically, obliquely, transversely and in 
all other possible directions, dividing it into strata and 
immense blocks, outlined in all imaginable shapes by 
some terrible upheavals or stupendous pressure. It 
must have been during such convulsive demonstra- 
tions of nature's tremendous forces that the prodigious 
boulders, some of them as large as houses, found all 
along the base of the mountains and scattered all 
over the valley, became detached and made their 
crashing descent into the gorge below. It is by this 
rough method of stone-cutting that the steep and, in 
some places, perpendicular mountain sides present 
such a wall-like appearance and grotesque figures on 




AGASSIZ COLUMN, »5 FEET. 



ASCENT OF YOSEMITE PEAK 115 

their surfaces. So at a point near Mirror Lake there 
is a striking bas-relief of the clean-cut features of a 
stern face, which, if framed and exhibited in an art 
gallery, would at once be recognized as the face of a 
Roman soldier. From another point near the Happy 
Isles can be seen on the perpendicular cliff the out- 
lines of the head of a dog in an attitude suggesting 
rest after an arduous and long chase. The tree 
growth on these walls of stone is something remark- 
able. There are trees that seem to prefer barren, 
sterile stone to nourishing, loose soil. The live oak, 
cedar, pine and mountain laurel are fond of a soil of 
stone. Some of these trees send their bark-covered 
roots ten and twenty feet over the cold, bare stone in 
search of some fissure or crevice, into which they can 
penetrate and find another point of anchorage for the 
trunk and an additional source of scanty food and 
water supply. Granite has become proverbial in sug- 
gesting hardness, durability and permanence. But 
nature is never stationary. Permanency with her 
means ceaseless changes, and granite is not exempt 
from these. 

"Devouring Time and envious Age, all things 
yield to you, and with lingering death you 
destroy step by step with venomed tooth 
whatever you attack." — Ovidius. 

This, the hardest and most durable of all stones, 
exposed to the outward destructive elements — heat, 
cold and rain — yields to nature's exacting laws, and 
in the course of time is softened, crumbles, and is con- 
verted into a coarse sand which becomes an important 
ingredient of the forming soil. The fertile soil at the 
base of the mountains and on the slopes is made up 



116 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

largely of this granite sand. On the Yosemite Peak 
these imperceptible, slow, but inevitable, changes are 
exhibited in a most striking and instructive manner. 
The bridle path and the narrow spaces between the 
immense boulders are covered with this granite debris, 
the nucleus for the scant surface soil. Large and 
small flat pieces of granite have become sequestrated 
from the mother rock under the subtle destructive 
changes wrought by ages, and have been made so 
brittle that they can be crushed between the fingers. 
The vertical walls exhibit the same insidious effects 
of the elements, more especially the slow but sure 
action of flowing and dropping water. In the course 
of centuries the little springs issuing from fissures in 
the rock and flowing down the granite face will chisel 
deep grooves of the strangest designs. 

The proverb, '* Distance lends enchantment," 
applies with special force to Yosemite Valley. It 
appears in its grandest beauty from one of the man}^ 
peaks which for thousands of years have guarded its 
precipitous ramparts and towering ravelins. Looking 
down into the peaceful, quiet valley from a great 
height makes an entirely different impression than to 
look up from it toward the confining, stupendous walls 
of stone. In the valley a sense of isolation, of impris- 
onment, overtakes the visitor, all of which leaves him 
as he ascends the steep walls and looks down upon 
the placid scenery below, and when he reaches the 
brim of the great gorge he sees beyond the snow-clad 
mountains and above him the great blue dome of the 
sky, seemingly resting on the shoulders of the rugged 
Sierra Mountains. If Job had seen the sky that over- 
hangs the Yosemite Valley and the bare peaks and 




UPPER YOSEMITE FALLS, I,6oO FEET, AND ICE CONE 
500 FEET. 



ASCENT OF YOSEMITE PEAK 117 

tree-clad mountains which guard its entrance, he would 
not have said: 

"Hast thou with him spread out the sky, 
which is strong, and as a molten looking-glass?" 
— Job xxxvii^ i8. 

If he had seen the deep azure-blue of this great dome, 
illuminated by the splendor of the rays of the August 
sun or by the pale full moon at midnight, as we did, 
he would have exclaimed with Southey: 

"Blue, darkly, deeply, beautifully blue." 
Or would have sung with Addison: 

"The spacious firmament on high, 
With all the blue ethereal sky, 
And spangled heavens, a shining frame, 
Their great original proclaim." 

Much has been said about the beauty of the Italian 
sky. Let those who have never seen the dark blue, 
the beautifully blue of the Yosemite sky come and 
see what nature has done here in the way of tint- 
ing the sky with an indescribable blue, a blue for 
which the artist has no colors and no mixture of colors, 
a royal blue unknown in Italy, a blue worthy of the 
grand sceneries over which it has pitched its limitless 
tent. 

Of the many trails leading from Yosemite Valley to 
the different most important peaks, the one by which 
the Yosemite Peak, at the head of Yosemite Falls, is 
reached is the steepest and most difficult to ascend. 
The mules employed for this purpose are well-trained 
and sure-footed animals. Mules have earned an unen- 
viable reputation for being stubborn — a reputation 
undeserved by the docile, willing little animals on 



118 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

special duty here. They understand their business 
and appear to be conscious of the responsibility placed 
upon them in carrying their human freight over the 
narrow, stony, steep and crooked bridle-path from the 
valley to the peak. There are places where a single 
misstep would result disastrously to animal and rider, 
and it is in such places the limber, faithful little ani- 
mals exercise their greatest caution, reaching out 
slowly with their feet and measuring with their accu- 
rate eyes every inch of ground before the step is taken. 
The bridle is useless, as the animal knows much more 
about mountain-climbing than the tenderfoot rider. 
In making some of the short turns at the very brink of 
a yawning precipice, the lithe little body is twisted 
into an acute angle during the sudden change in the 
direction of the narrow, stony path. The ascent from 
the valley begins by entering a deep, heavily-timbered 
canyon, and the path winds its way among boulders 
of enormous size. The grade becomes at once very 
steep, and in short, zigzag turns — some of them not 
more than ten paces apart — the path leads up to a 
place where, to the uninitiated, it appears impossible to 
find an escape in an upward direction. A perpendic- 
ular wall of stone more than i,ooo feet high frowns 
upon the expectant and puzzled rider. "With a sense 
of relief he looks back upon the valley as it recedes 
from view, its river, houses and trees growing smaller 
with every turn of the terrace-like path. As the for- 
bidding, wall-like cliff is reached, the limber little 
mule turns to the right and follows a trail that skirts 
the mountain and, by a long, gentle incline, leads 
through another canyon to the very feet of the first 
fall of the Yosemite. 




YOSEMITE FALLS. 



ASCENT OF YO SEMITE PEAK 119 

We see here, standing near, the spray of the 
sheet of water that in one leap has made a fall of 
1, 600 feet, and will repeat the same feat twice on a 
smaller scale before it finds rest in the bed of the 
sleepy Merced in the valley below. We take a long 
look at the many new things which have made their 
appearance in the valley and its mural enclosure, when 
the climb, steeper than ever, is resumed. The path 
winds its way through a gap between the Yosemite 
Peak and Eagle Peak, where a little soil has accumu- 
lated and the green grass and stately pine trees and 
alpine flowers have transformed it into a veritable 
park. Up to this height the path is shaded much of 
the time by live oak, black oak, dwarfed red cedar, 
stunted soft maple and the fragrant mountain laurel. 
From the Yosemite Peak an inspiring view of the val- 
ley is obtained with the many peaks, spires, domes, cliffs 
and crags that crown the enclosing gigantic granite 
walls. The hotel below and the adjoining buildings 
look like toy houses; the Merced is merely an undulat- 
ing silver band dividing the grassy meadows interrupted 
here and there by the enormous trees, which the dis- 
tance from here has reduced to the size of shrubs. 
Cattle and horses grazing in the meadows are but mov- 
ing specks, and a passing stage-coach is no larger than 
a baby carriage. The cool mountain breeze fans our 
sunburnt faces, and the lungs, used to the dust-laden, 
smoky Chicago air, we inhale with a hunger that can 
not be appeased. Way beyond and above the highest 
spires and domes that form a part of the valley walls, 
loom up the snow-flecked peaks, the monarchs of the 
Sierras. From the opposite Glacier Point the 
charmed tourist can even see a remnant of the glacial 



120 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

period in the form of a glacier that has so far success- 
fully resisted the warmest breaths of thousands of 
summer suns. From the peak a well-made stone stair- 
case brings the traveler down to a stone platform con- 
sisting of a projecting rock, surrounded by an iron 
railing almost directly over the precipice from which 
the Yosemite takes its first fearful leap into the yawn- 
ing chasm below. The angry, foaming current, in its 
wild descent, dashes against the unfeeling granite wall 
and in its fury sends up a column of spray which 
reaches us in the form of a mist. We see where the 
water strikes a stone platform i,6oo feet below and 
recoils in foam and spray, when it again gathers 
strength and courage and through a deep groove worn 
out of the rock rushes on in cataracts to the middle 
and finally the third fall, to mingle in a few moments 
later with the crystal, clear, smooth, quiet water of 
the Merced. 

The Yosemite Falls, viewed from different points and 
from different altitudes, are not surpassed in grandeur, 
grace and beauty by many whose reputations have 
been immortalized in prose and song. The height of 
the first fall, the rapids coursing through channels 
made in the rock by the angry waters, the two lesser 
falls below, the magnificent mountain scenery, and the 
charming valley beneath, with meadows and forests, 
and the lovely Merced receiving the foam-crested, agi- 
tated, restless, fleeing waters of theYosemite, impart to 
these falls an indescribable charm. Above the falls 
the Yosemite Creek winds its way on the high moun- 
tain plateau, between boulders of prodigious size, 
through a shallow ravine with a granite floor, and the 
water finds a moment of rest in two large basins worn 




WASHINX.TON COLUMN, I,SoO FEET, AND HALF DOME, 
5,000 FEET. 



MIRROR LAKE 121 

out of the rock by its incessant action, before it makes 
its three successive leaps into the valley below. 

MIRROR LAKE. 

The most restful, pleasing feature of the Yosemite 
Valley is the miniature, bewitching Mirror Lake. It 
is what its name implies, a natural mirror. The little 
lake is simply an expansion of the river almost as soon 
as it enters the valley, forcing its way between 
boulders which have stood immovably in its way since 
they severed their connection with the towering 
mountains which here contract the valley to a narrow, 
dark gorge which is visited by the sun only a few 
hours during the middle of the day. This little lake 
has its bays and islets, its sandy banks and rocky 
shores, and, more than all, its crystal, clear water 
which reflects the shadows with an accuracy that cre- 
ates wonder and commands admiration. The time to 
visit this natural mirror is either at sunrise or sunset, 
preferably the former. The high mountains are 
reflected in the water in sharp outlines. Every shadow 
on them can be seen with marvelous distinctness; 
every minute detail of outline is made plain. When 
the sun rises, a little after eight o'clock, a ball of 
golden splendor is seen in the crystal water, to which 
the water imparts a silvery hue. As the shadows of 
the mountains appear in the inverted image in the 
water, the cliffs, crags, trees and shrubs are seen with 
a distinctness well calculated to cast reflections on the 
art of photography. The little sheet of water with 
its magic power of reflection and romantic surround- 
ings would be an ample reward for all hardships inci- 
dent to a long and rough stage voyage, but it is only 



122 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

one of the great many points of interest the Yosemite 
Valley has in store for the thousands of its annual 
visitors. The pure, cool mountain air is hostile to 
the pest of the summer tourist — the mosquito. The 
many nectar-producing flowers attract butterflies of 
all hues. They are in the valley, on the mountain 
slopes, and sail about the rugged peaks sipping the 
nectar from the dainty corollas of the loveliest 
alpine flowers. Happy creatures 1 

"What more felicitie can fall to creature 
Than to enjoy delight with libertie, 
And to be lord of all the workes of Nature, 

To raine in th' aire from earth to highest skie, 
To feed on flowers and weeds of glorious feature." 

— Spenser. 

A SCANDALOUS SLAUGHTER OF TREES. 

On the way from Wawona to the Yosemite Valley, 
the tourist is made to look upon a scene which is 
well calculated to sicken the heart of every lover 
of nature. In the midst of a noble forest of yellow 
and sugar pine, an immense sawmill has been es- 
tablished, with all modern machinery attached, to 
carry on a slaughter of trees on a large scale. The 
murderous implements of destruction of tree-life are 
of such an effective kind that in a short time miles of 
the beautiful forest will be laid waste. A company 
with ample means, bent upon amassing greater wealth, 
bought here a large tract of land before the timber 
reserve law went into effect, hence are in possession of 
the right to deal with the forest at pleasure. A small 
village of frame huts for the workingmen sprang up 
near the sawmill like a mushroom. A narrow-gauge 
railway makes the most remote parts of the tract 



A SCANDALOUS SLAUGHTER OF TREES 123 

accessible. From the sawmill, like a monster octopus, 
log slides reach out in different directions, over which 
ihe immense logs are dragged by a powerful jack 
engine by means of a strong wire cable a mile in 
length. A flume sixty-five miles long conveys the 
lumber from the sawmill to the nearest railway sta- 
tion. Nothing is seen here of the old methods of 
logging except the cutting down of the trees and seg- 
mentation of their trunks into logs of desirable length. 
Machinery has taken the place of hand labor and 
animal traction. Slaughter on a larger scale is in 
progress, and ruin and devastation will soon take the 
place of a large part of this magnificent pine forest. 
The work of destruction is well on the way. The 
buzz of the sawmill has disturbed the solitude. The 
clash of the woodman's ax, the monotonous rasping 
sound of the hand-saw, and the dull thud of falling 
trees, are heard on every side. The logs, stripped of 
their bark, unwillingly follow the wire rope over the 
rough timber slides from all available directions to the 
final place of mutilation. The bleeding stumps and 
withering foliage of the recent victims appeal in vain 
for mercy. It is only a question of time before every 
tree of desirable size in this great tract will meet the 
same cruel fate. It has taken nature centuries to 
build this great forest; man, in his greed for gold, will 
ruin it in as many months. The work carried on here 
is not humane lumbering; it is slaughter. The wood- 
man's ax knows no discretion. The young must die 
with the old. Every tree large enough to yield lum- 
ber a foot, or even less, in width must be sacrificed. 
Fire follows this carnage and kills what is left. This 
company has no thought of the future; has no regard 



124 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

for coming generations. It has entered the very heart 
of the Sierran forest to destroy that part of it over 
which the government, for a paltry sum, has lost con- 
trol. No one can pass through this place of methodi- 
cal, mercenary forest-destruction without becoming 
impressed with the idea that trees, like water, should 
be common property, entitled to protection by strict 
and just government regulations, for the benefit of all 
for whom they were intended. 

THE GREAT FORESTS OF THE SIERRAS. 

Soil and forests are the wealth of a country. Soil 
without forests deteriorates, and in the course of time 
is swept away or buried by floods. Forests are the 
natural irrigators and builders of the soil. The foli- 
age of the trees and the surface soil are the great 
sponges which nature employs in storing up the water 
from the melting snow and the falling rain, and the 
reservoirs from which adjacent treeless plains receive 
the needed moisture during the dry seasons. Civilized 
nations, with their multitudinous needs for timber, and 
growing desire for wealth, are the most dangerous 
enemies of nature's greatest boon to man — the prime- 
val forests. The primitive peoples had very little use 
for wood, and consequently the forests remained in 
their primeval beauty until the demands of civilization 
initiated a war of destruction which has continued in 
a most relentless manner until a large part of the most 
fertile portions of the globe has been stripped of its 
trees and converted into a desert. Syria, Palestine, 
Greece, Turkey, Italy, Spain and the southern part of 
Austria have met this fate. Floods and drought have 
everywhere followed the destructive work of the wood- 




VERNAL FALL, 35O FEET. 



THE GREAT FORESTS OF THE SIERRAS 125 

man's ax. What escaped the murderous implements 
of man yielded to forest fires fed by the parts of the 
perished trees for which the aggressive enemy had no 
use. 

I have seen the treeless mountains of Syria, Pal- 
estine and southern Europe and the terrible con- 
sequences of their deforestation by thoughtless, selfish 
man. All of these countries, formerly the granaries 
that supplied the then known world with food, have 
become impoverished; they have lost their water and 
their soil, with the inevitable consequences following — 
floods, drought, squalor and famine. The green tree- 
tops break the heavy downpour of rain and catch the 
fleecy flakes of snow, and from them a gentle, drizzling 
rain percolates the soil beneath. Remove these 
natural storehouses of moisture between clouds and 
earth, and the heavy rains and melting snow will collect- 
in torrents, carrying with them the fertile soil on their 
swift journey to the nearest lake or ocean, lost forever to 
their unfortunate owners. Heavy rains give birth to 
devastating inundations; vegetation becomes more and 
more scanty; the soil dry and parched, and in less time 
than one can imagine, a once fertile country has 
become a desert, and a once powerful, prosperous 
nation is impoverished and loses its independence. 

The history of the Orient during the last two thou- 
sand years has demonstrated the value of forests and 
the fearful consequences that are sure to follow their 
destruction by short-sighted, reckless man. The 
Orient has furnished the world with an object-lesson 
illustrative of the importance of forest-protection that 
can not be misandcrstood or ignored. Have we 
Americans profited by the experience of the past.^* 



126 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

Let our forests tell the story. When the white man 
set his foot upon American soil, the country that we 
now call our own was clad with an unbroken forest 
extending from the Atlantic to the Mississippi, and 
which since the last glacial period, 80,000 years ago, 
had gained a firm foothold upon the slopes of the Rocky 
and Sierra Nevada Mountains. Great rivers fed by 
converging streams coursed through the fertile valleys, 
and a luxurious vegetation covered the vast virgin sur- 
face soil, percolated by the water from the immense 
natural system of irrigation. The savages who inhab- 
ited these dense forests made no demands on these 
enormous timber resources. Occasionally the trunk 
of one of the giants of the forests was converted into 
a canoe, some of the saplings had to serve as tepee 
poles, and the glimmering camp-fires were fed with 
dry branches of fallen dead trees, and here and there 
little patches in the forests were cleared for better 
pastures and to extract from the soil only the very 
necessities of life. 

With the coming of the white man the fate of 
these stately forests was sealed. The ax and the 
sawmill began their deadly work, and the onslaught 
has been maintained with unremitting vigor until the 
present time, when we begin to realize the extent 
of the national calamity for which they and they alone 
are responsible. Thousands of our tree-destroyers 
have extracted millions from their helpless victims. 

Until recently the government has not only tolerated, 
but has encouraged this systematic war of tree-exter- 
mination, and the railway and navigation companies 
have extended a willing hand for a selfish purpose. 
The work of extermination has been made more effec- 




IN THE MARIPOSA BIG TREE GROVE, FROM THE WAWONA. 



THE GREAT FORESTS OF THE SIERRAS 127 

tive and remunerative by the substitution of machin- 
ery for hand labor and by the organization of wealthy 
corporations which now monopolize what little 
available timber is left. Many of the Eastern States 
have lost their timber and their soil. Thousands of 
farms have been abandoned. The two Virginias, once 
so prosperous, have been made to realize that agri- 
culture wanes with the beginning of deforestation. 
Maryland is undergoing the same bitter experience. 
The two younger States, Wisconsin and Michigan, 
have been stripped of their magnificent forests, and as 
a result millions of acres have been converted into a 
desert that can never be reclaimed. In northern Wis- 
consin alone, by forest destruction by ax and fire, some 
4,000,CX)0 acres have, during the last generation, been 
turned into a desert as nearly as is possible in the cli- 
mate of that State; besides, another 4,000,000 acres 
have been changed into useless brushwood. These 
figures are appalling. Here is a loss of 800,000,000 
feet, board measure, which this non-arable acreage 
could produce annually if the soil were rationally 
used. 

The great naturalist, Alexander von Humboldt, 
sounded a timely alarm when he exclaimed, in his 
"Cosmos": . 

''How foolish does man appear in destroying 
the mountain forests, for thereby he deprives 
himself of wood and water at the same time." 

And he should have added, of soil also! We have 
lost not only a vast area ol surface soil that has impov- 
erished thousands of families that depended on agri- 
culture; we have lost from the same cause many of 
our navigable rivers. In a very interesting forest 



128 VOSEMlTE VALLEY 

survey of Wisconsin we read: ''The flow of all the 
larger rivers has changed during the last forty years, 
navigation has been abandoned on the Wisconsin, log- 
ging and rafting have become difficult on all the rivers, 
and what is even a far surer measure, the Fox River 
is failing to furnish the power which it formerly sup- 
plied in abundance." What is stated here applies to 
all the rivers and water-courses where deforestation 
has been carried on to the same extent. After ruining 
the northern part of Wisconsin and Michigan, the 
lumbermen are laying their greedy hands on the 
Southern forests, and it will not be many years before 
Florida, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi and Louisiana 
will be in the same deplorable condition. This war 
against trees has extended to the distant West, where 
the great forests of the Sierra Nevada, the pride of 
the Pacific slope, are threatened by mutilation, if not 
extinction. The citizens of California and the people 
of the United States as a whole should protest against 
destructive deforestation of the grandest forest the 
Creator has seen fit to plant on earth. No other 
country ever was crowned by such a forest, and no 
other soil ever produced trees of such gigantic size and 
such noble bearing. Enter these forests wherever 
you will and estimate with your astonished eyes the 
height and breadth of the giant pines and cedars, you 
will for once feel satisfied that you are indeed in the 
midst of an ideal forest such as poets and travelers 
have so often attempted to describe, and you will in 
your ecstacy repeat to yourself or to your companions, 
again and again: 

"This is the forest primeval." 
— Longfellow. 



THE GREAT FORESTS OE THE SIERRAS 129 

In the distribution of the greatest and choicest 
gifts, Nature has been very partial to the Pacific slope. 
She has endowed it with a climate that has no equal, 
with a vegetation more variable and beautiful than 
can be seen anywhere else over the same extent of 
country, and with a primeval forest that defies descrip- 
tion. If Keats had seen this forest of stately pines, he 
would have made the pine, and not the oak, the sena- 
tor of the woods, when he wrote: 

"Those green-robed senators of mighty woods, 
Tall oaks, branch-charmed by the earnest stars, 
Dream, and so dream all night without a stir." 

What a change from the barren, weather-worn, 
parched soil of the deforested deserts to these mighty 
evergreen woods with the balmy air filled with the 
music of bubbling springs, murmuring brooks, splash- 
ing cataracts and rippling rivers 1 Nature has not 
been sufficiently interfered with here by man to mar 
her beauty, and as we admire her grandest effort in 
teaching man what she can accomplish in her vege- 
table domain, we heartily join in: 

"Let us a little permit Nature so to take her 
own way; she better understands her own 
affairs than we." — Montaigne. 

Indeed, we must arrive at the conclusion that it is 
wise for man to imitate her example and teachings 
rather than to oppose them. It is fortunate that 
these mighty forests of the Sierras have been spared 
sufficiently long for the people to become aroused to 
the necessity of resorting to stringent measures calcu- 
lated to protect them against further mutilation. The 
giant pines and cedars and the monster sequoias and 



130 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

the magnificent redwoods of these forests are the 
pride of California and the admiration of the world. 
These wonders of the vegetable kingdom are the 
greatest attractions of California, which induce annu- 
ally thousands of visitors from every State of the 
Union and from distant lands to come and see what 
Nature has on exhibition here in the way of giant 
growth in her vegetable domain. California is fully 
aware of the sacredness and responsibility of her trust 
in the preservation of her forests, the like of which no 
other country has ever produced. The general govern- 
ment is doing its share toward this end by setting 
aside for the public benefit and pleasure a number of 
large forest reserves. Associations and individuals are 
in hearty cooperation with these movements, and it is 
to be hoped that these combined efforts will prove 
effective in preventing further irrational, suicidal 
deforestation by ax or deflagration. The tourist from 
the dusty, noisy, busy cities will find in these shady, 
cool forests the solitude and mental rest he seeks. 
He will experience here that 

"Solitude sometimes is best society, and short 
retirement urges sweet return." — Milton, 

With the majestic trees above him, the varied animal 
and vegetable life around him, if he is interested in the 
book of nature, he can not resist the idea: 

"They are never alone that are accompanied 
by noble thoughts." — Milton, 

If he will spend a few days among these monarch 
trees, eat frugal meals, quench his thirst with the 
purest and coldest water from the mountain springs, 



THE GREAT FORESTS OF THE SIERRAS 131 

exercise his flabby muscles by mountain-climbing, 
sleep on boughs of the fragrant balsam fir, and 
listen to the lullaby in the tree-tops on moonlit nights, 
he will begin to realize that 

"Sleep, gentle that it is, spurns not the 
humble cots of the peasants and the shady 
bank. " — Horatius. 

It is the impressive solitude of a great mountain 
forest, with the sublime thoughts that it creates in the 
mind and the physical opportunities it offers, that 
soothes the irritable brain and invigorates the worn- 
out body pleading for a change of habitude. The 
primeval forests of California will become the Mecca 
for the class of tourists in need of such a radical 
change. Millions will reap the benefits of its inspiring, 
sleep-producing, health-restoring mountain forests. 
The fascination of these forests is to be found in 
their extent, and the size, beauty and virtue of their 
trees. To ride or walk through an unbroken primeval 
forest fifty, a hundred and more miles, is no ordinary 
source of pleasure; it is an experience that makes a 
lasting impression. The eyes never tire in studying 
the vestments and emerald-green crowns of the colos- 
sal trees and in measuring their columnar, branchless 
trunks. The mountain peaks, cliffs and crags, the 
immense boulders that separated their connection 
with the mother rocks thousands of years ago and have 
found a resting-place on the mountain slopes or in 
some dark, deep canyon, where they are caressed by 
the rippling waters of a mountain stream, and the 
cone and needle-strewn surface decorated with sub- 
alpine and alpine flowers in gay attire, form a back- 
ground worthy of the leading feature of the forest 



132 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

picture. The solitude is impressive and is greatly 
magnified when the retiring sun throws its last rays 
upon the towering tree-tops and the shadows of the 
night begin to darken the pillared space beneath. It 
borders on awe when night takes possession of the 
scene; when the sighing trees appear like phantoms 
under the blue dome of the cloudless, starry sky, 
feebly illuminated by the pale face of the new moon. 
No pen, no brush, is competent to reproduce in 
language or pictures what the eye can see here. 
Nature defies imitation by imperfect, ignorant man 
everywhere, but here she laughs to scorn the learning 
as well as the skill of men. In the presence of these 
mammoth trees, in view of the snow-flecked mountain- 
peaks, under the influence of the invigorating, cool, 
balsamic mountain air, we are made willing to admit, 
if we have not done so before, under less inspiring 
environments: 

"Small draughts of knowledge lead to 
atheims, but larger bring man back to God." 

— Bacon. 

The very size of the trees impress upon us the 
important lesson that power and influence are not 
incompatible with modesty and unselfishness. Many 
a small, scrubby, crippled tree sends out its greedy 
roots much further than the princely pines; others, 
equally stunted and deformed, show their selfishness 
by exerting all their energies in developing their 
branches and foliage to an extent to inhibit tree-life 
within the area they claim as their own. They tres- 
pass upon the rights of their own kind to the fullest 
extent of their rapacious capacity, and maintain a 
bitter hostility toward their most friendly and hospi- 

9 



THE GREAT FORESTS OF THE SIERRAS 133 

table neighbors. The immense size, vigorous health 
and noble bearing of these giants of the forest furnish 
ample proof of their virtue. The largest of these 
trees are only to be found at an altitude of not less 
than 2,000 feet, and their size and vigor increase up to 
an altitude of 6,000 feet. They are fond of a scant, 
rocky soil, and love to send their roots between massive 
boulders and deep down into clefts of the underlying 
rock. They maintain their proud, erect position from 
earliest infancy until extreme old age, and very often, 
after life is extinct, the bleached, white, barkless 
corpse refuses to part from the soil which nourished it 
so long. 

These big trees are sociable, and enjoy the com- 
panionship of their equals. The foothills of the 
Sierras are inhabited by the nu>t pine, white, black 
and live oak; then, at a higher elevation, come, first, 
the yellow pine and white and red cedar; then the 
sugar pine, and finally, the monarch of the forest, the 
sequoia. The three largest trees — the yellow and 
sugar pine and the sequoia — seem to be particularly 
on the most intimate and friendly terms, and exceed- 
ingly fond of companionship among themselves, and 
yet these ruling princes have never attempted to 
establish an exclusive society. They recognize and 
respect the rights of their inferiors, and are charitable 
in their dealings with the weak and oppressed. Con- 
scious of their noble birth and proud of their 
ancestry, they maintain a dignity which commands 
respect and invites emulation. The oaks, cedars and 
firs, in their companionship and stimulated by their 
noble example, grow better and straighter, their 
branches fewer, reaching upward instead of out- 



134 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

ward and downward, in deference to their neighbors. 
They try in vain to equal their superiors in height, 
but in their earnest efforts to do so they add to the 
betterment of their race. There is no such an intense 
struggle for existence here as in the dense pine forests 
of the Yellowstone Park. The trees are sufficiently 
far apart to not interfere with each other in their 
commendable ambition to look down upon the 
naked mountain peaks and pierce the clouds far above. 
Over-population is carefully avoided by these giant 
races for the very reason that it takes centuries for 
their inhabitants to take the place of those who finally 
succumb to the inevitable consequences of the limita- 
tion of life. We find here no unnatural crowding, no 
crippling or starvation for want of space and nutri- 
ment, no indications whatever of premeditated, wil- 
ful murder. The trees in the region of the Yosemite 
and other equally favored places in California attain 
the maximum size by a combination of a number of 
causes, each one of which has its influence in the pro- 
motion of tree-growth and tree-preservation. 

Mr. J. G. Lemmon, of Oakland, Cal., the dis- 
tinguished naturalist of the Pacific slope, has given 
this subject careful attention, and his explanations are 
founded on a scientific basis. According to his views, 
the plants migrating from the south at the beginning 
of the Thermal Age, 8o,cxx) years ago, were divided at 
the outset in southern Mexico and a large part barred 
out of the Mississippi Valley by the Cordilleras, that 
killed off unfortunate individuals or families which 
ascended their foothills, thus giving to the Pacific 
slope the largest share and largest growths. [J. G. 
Lemmon, "How to Tell the Trees," 1902.] 




THE GRIZZLY GIANT, MARIPOSA GROVE. 



THE GREAT FORESTS OF THE SIERRAS 135 

The next element of giant growth is to be found in 
the warm Japan current, the Kuro-Siwa, which has its 
origin in the North Pacific Ocean, strikes the islands 
along the southern coast of China, from whence it is 
deflected northward to Japan, and from there across 
the Pacific, striking the southern side of the long chain 
of Aleutian Islands, which turn a part of the current 
down along the American coast until it breathes 
its tropical, life-imparting breath upon the forests of 
the Pacific slope. The mingling of the cool ocean 
breezes with the warm moisture-laden air of the 
Japanese current results in an atmosphere most con- 
ducive to tree-growth. The last, and perhaps the 
most important determining cause of giant tree- 
growth, is the equable and unsurpassed climate of 
California. Under the influence of these causes the 
giants of the forest are born, grow slowly, exempt from 
disease, protected against the fury of the storm and 
the icy grasp of the Arctic winter, and reach their 
maximum size and extreme limit of life after a peace- 
ful existence of hundreds and thousands of years. 

The salubrious climate of California is as conducive 
to the preservation and restoration of lost health and 
the prolongation of human life as it is to the growth of 
trees to such fabulous size and ripening of the choicest 
fruits and bringing forth flowers of the most charming 
beauty and most exquisite fragrance. These great 
forests have won the admiration of the world, and 
Californians must remain alive to the fact that upon 
them will rest the responsibility of their preservation 
in the future. Nature has lavished upon them so 
many of her choicest gifts that it would be basest 
ingratitude on their part to permit the ruination of her 



136 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

grandest efforts to grow trees such as no other soil and 
no other climate can produce. 

GIANT TREES OF THE SIERRAS. 

Yellow Pine (Pinus ponderosa, Dougl.). The for- 
ests of California possess more species of resinous- 
wooded, needle-leaved, cone -bearing trees than any 
equal area in the world, and these trees are either the 
largest in dimensions or they bear the largest cones 
that the earth has produced since it was created. 
They number thirteen genera, comprising forty 
species. Of the pines, the yellow, great sugar and the 
Jeffrey are the largest, attaining a height of 220 feet, 
with a diameter of 10 to 12 feet. Five of the pines 
are noted for the large size of their cones. The sugar 
pine has a cone 15 to 20 inches in length; that of the 
Coulter pine often weighs from 8 to 10 pounds; the 
Gray pine, 3 to 4 pounds; the Torrey pine, 2 pounds, 
and the Jeffrey pine, >^ to 2 pounds [Lemmon]. The 
most useful of the pines are the yellow, sugar and 
Jeffrey. The yellow pine is one of the trees coveted 
by the men who enrich themselves by tree-killing and 
forest-destruction. Its immense, column-like, limbless 
body yields a rich harvest of knotless, valuable lum- 
ber. The tree measures 200 to scx) feet in height, and 
from 8 to 10 feet in diameter. The trunk is as 
straight as an arrow, surmounted by a modest crown 
of strong, rectangular, short limbs with branchlets 
decorated with dark-green leaves in threes. The wood 
is yellowish, hard and durable. This tree is closely 
related to the long-leaf pine of Georgia. The several 
varieties of this species of pine differ in the structure 
and color of the bark. The bark varies in color and 




^^^^1 



WAWONA WITH THE STAGE, MARIPOSA GROVE, 



GIANT TREES OF THE SIERRAS 137 

thickness. The most common color is whitish or a 
light yellow, the large, longitudinal plates connected 
by depressions of a deeper color, imparting to the sur- 
face a mosaic-like appearance. The cones are conical 
ovate, 2 to 5 inches long. The yellow pine associates 
freely with the sugar pine and white and red cedar, 
all of these trees competing with each other in attain- 
ing the greatest height and circumference. 

Sugar Pine (Pinus Lambertiana). This is the 
largest of the group of white pines, scattered freely 
among the large trees of the Sierras, never segregating 
itself in any particular locality. It appears to enjoy 
communionship with its giant neighbors. It attains a 
height of I20 to 300 feet and a diameter of 10 to 20 
feet. The wood is white, very light, and is used 
extensively for interior finish. It is surpassed in size 
only by the giant sequoia. The bark is grayish and 
finely checked, the plates being smaller than those of 
the yellow pine. It derives its name from a sweet 
substance which exudes from wounded places. The 
short leaves are arranged in fives. The cones, the 
largest known, are 10 to 26 inches long and 2 to 4 
inches thick, and are of a bronze-green color until 
ripe. This tree is an imposing personage in the 
mighty woods of the high mountain slopes. The mas- 
sive stem is limbless for 100 to 200 feet, its larger 
upper limbs outstretched, bearing the dark-green foli- 
age and the immense russet cones, give it a command- 
ing position among the distinguished trees with whom 
it has so much in common. 

Giant Sequoia (Sequoia Washingtonia). This is 
the most wonderful tree on the face of the earth, as it 
is to the vegetable what the mammoth was to the ani- 



138 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

mal kingdom. The mammoth is extinct; the sequoia 
remains. What a story the veterans among them 
could relate! Some of them had reached maturity 
when Egypt was in the height of its prosperity and 
power, and many of them were old when Columbus 
discovered the land which they selected for their 
exclusive habitation. The name which this colossal 
tree now bears has had an eventful history. As it is 
the largest tree the earth has ever produced, it is very 
proper that it should be designated by a name that 
should reflect its greatness. It required a long time 
and many a heated discussion until this matter was 
definitely settled. Mr. J. G. Lemmon has taken a 
keen interest in this transaction, and has given a full 
and detailed account of it in his excellent little book, 
West-American Cone-Bearers' ' [ 1900]. The tree was 
discovered at an unknown early date, and was first 
described by Lambert in 1803, who called it Taxodium 
sempervirens. In 1847 it was given the present family 
name Sequoia by Endlicher, a German botanist, to 
which he added the specific name gigantea, now 
known as the redwood tree (Sequoia sempervirens). 
The Sierra big tree, another species and the one now 
under consideration, was discovered in 1852. Speci- 
mens were sent to Dr. Lindley, of London, who 
named it, in honor of the Duke of Wellington, Wel- 
lingtonia gigantea. The next year Decaisne, a French 
botanist, recognizing it as a species of sequoia, 
changed it to Sequoia gigantea. In 1854 Dr. C. E. 
Winslow, from purely patriotic motives, argued that 
it should bear the name of the greatest of all Ameri- 
cans, and insisted that it should be called Taxodium 
Washingtonianum, or Washingtonia Californica. A 



I 



GIANT TREES OF THE SiERRAS 139 

year later Sargent described it in his "Sylva" under 
the name of Sequoia Wellingtonia, a name given it 
by Seaman in 1855. Sudworth finally settled the diffi- 
culty on a permanent basis recognized as being 
authoritative by substituting for the specific name 
Washingtonia, a change that will meet with the 
hearty approval of every true American. To know 
this monarch of the forest it must be seen. No 
pen-picture can do it justice, and all attempts at illus- 
tration convey but a very imperfect idea of its inde- 
scribable grandeur and monstrous size. Its greatness 
can only be appreciated when it is seen in its moun- 
tain home, surrounded by the distinguished senators of 
the woods — the sugar pine, the yellow pine and the 
cedar — the latter imitating it very closely indeed in 
its general appearance and dress. Another tree that 
resembles it very much in height and noble bearing is 
the Cryptomeria Japonica, a tree familiar to all tourists 
who have visited Japan. The Big Tree — for by this 
name it will always be known by the layman — is an 
evergreen, cone-bearing tree, a near relative of the 
coast redwood (Sequoia sempervirens), the famous 
lumber-tree of the coast of California. The giant 
sequoias are limited to a few groves in the high 
Sierras, from Placer and Calaveras counties to Kings 
county. It was my good fortune to visit the Mariposa 
grove, eight miles distant from Wawona. This won- 
der of the vegetable creation loves family life, but is 
tolerant and hospitable toward its neighbors, and does 
not encourage segregation. In looking at the small 
family groups of these giant trees in the magnificent 
forest of pine and cedar, it occurred to me that I had 



140 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

before me the best possible illustration of what is 
meant by 

'*A brotherhood of venerable trees." 

— Woodsworth. 

These trees in the Sierras, in the midst of a magnifi- 
cent forest of pine and cedar, have been determined 
to be 300 to 400 feet high, limbless for 150 to 200 feet, 
and 30 to 40 feet in diameter, with an age dating back 
1,000 to 5,000 years. Some of these trees were in 
existence when their near relatives, the cedars of 
Lebanon, were sacrificed and used as a building 
material in the erection of the temple of Solomon. 
Notwithstanding their great age, every standing tree, 
with its colossal columnar trunk and its immense 
crown of green foliage, presents the picture of vigor- 
ous health. One of the limbs of the Giant Grizzly is 
six feet in diameter at its base, where it projects at a 
right angle to a great distance and then makes a sharp 
bend and terminates from that point in a straight, 
much-branched trunk which in itself would deserve 
the name of big tree. This disposition to tree-growth 
on the part of the large branches seems to be quite com- 
mon among the biggest trees. The bark is a reddish 
brown, very thick, deeply corrugated in a longitudinal 
direction, bearing a close resemblance in color and 
structure to the bark of the large mountain cedars with 
which this tree delights to associate. The leaves are 
scattered, small and scale-like, and the compact cones 
about the size of a hen's ^'g'g. The sequoia is 
extremely tenacious of life. The interior of the base 
of many of the trunks of the oldest trees is burned 
out, and the room-like spaces have for ages served 
as habitations for the Indians, and yet, as this tree 



I 



GIANT TREES OF THE SIERRAS 141 

has no tap-root, this serious encroachment upon the 
means of obtaining the necessary food-supply has 
impaired neither the health nor longevity of the trees. 
Such a burnt-out place at the base of the Wawona has 
been enlarged sufficiently to permit the passage of a 
stage-coach, and yet this veteran of the Mariposa 
Grove shows little indications of marasmus or senile 
decay. In the "Haverford, " sixteen horses have 
stood at the same time. The ''Workshop" has a 
capacious hollow at its base, 12 by 16 feet. The 
most famous tree of the Mariposa Grove at the present 
time is the "Grizzly Giant," that at its base meas- 
ures 92 feet, with a height of 275 feet. Mr. 
Hutchings, by counting the concentric growths 130 to 
the inch, estimates the age of this tree at 4,680 years. 
According to Prof. J. D. Whitney, State geologist, 
who made a map of every sequoia over a foot in diam- 
eter, ascertained that there are 365 large trees in the 
Mariposa Grove — corresponding to the number of days 
in a year. The sequoia is thoughtful in perpetuating its 
noble race. Thousands of little trees from a few 
inches to several feet in height are scattered through 
the grove, and many of them have found new homes 
in foreign countries through the courtesy of the State 
commissioners. The transplanting of these little trees 
to parts of the vast forest region adapted for the 
growth of the sequoia is one of the things that should 
receive the early and earnest attention of the officers 
in charge of the forest reserves for the enjoyment, 
instruction and benefit of generations thousands of 
years hence. 



142 YOSEMITE VALLEY 



THE DYING CEDAR. 



The great forests of the Sierra Nevada, in the 
Yosemite and for many miles around it, differ in many 
respects from the forests of the Yellowstone Park. 
The former comprises a great variety of trees, many 
of them of stupendous size; the latter is made up 
largely of white pine of uniform size, on an average 
100 feet in height and not more than a foot and a half 
in diameter. The Sierra trees are far apart, the space 
between them being commensurate with their size. 
The pine forests of the Yellowstone Park are dense, 
the scene of bitter struggle to determine the survival 
of the fittest. The over-population of the forests of 
the Yellowstone Park results in premature death on 
a large scale, as is seen from the number of dead, 
debarked, bleached trees standing erect, leaning 
against their survivors, or prostrate on the ground, 
forming an entanglement which in many places offers 
insurmountable obstacles to man and beast on their 
way through the forest. No such indications of 
intense struggle for existence are to be seen in the 
virgin forests of the Sierras. Although the soil in 
many places is scanty, by slow, steady growth, inter- 
rupted only by a short and comparatively mild winter, 
these trees reach their maximum giant size free from 
accident or disease, and finally die slowly, almost 
imperceptibly, from the effects of decrepitude incident 
to extreme old age. Contrary to what is seen in the 
Yellowstone Park, there is very little fallen timber. 
Storm and fire have inflicted but little damage to the 
timber untouched by the woodman's ax. These 
immense trees die as slowly and insidiously as they 
grow. Death from violence of any kind is rare. 



THE DYING CEDAR 143 

Deforestation from natural causes goes hand-in-hand 
with reforestation, so that the primeval forest remains 
the same for hundreds and thousands of years, pro- 
vided these interstitial processes are not disturbed by 
the meddlesome interferences of man. It is interest- 
ing to observe the gradual changes which take place 
in these trees when they have reached the limits of 
their long life and begin to yield to the effects of senile 
decay. In the unbroken forest these dying monarchs 
can be studied to greatest advantage. Nature's for- 
ester is at work here. He marks a tree here and there 
where over-population is threatened, and the first indi- 
cations of the slow but sure approach of death become 
apparent. The sprightliness of childhood, the gayety 
of youth, the power and endurance of manhood begin 
to decline almost imperceptibly. The hand of death 
touches first the parts of the tree most remote from 
the food-supply, in the peripheries of the expansions 
of the trunk, where circulation is first impaired. The 
foliage loses its brightness, here and there fascicles 
turn yellow, and the dead leaves sever their connection 
with the dying branchlet. The work of death has 
begun, and it is only a question of time when the tree 
thus marked will be counted among the dead. In the 
depth of the primeval forest, not far from the entrance 
to the Yosemite Valley, stands a veteran cedar which 
even to a superficial observer presents all the indica- 
tions of approaching death. It has been in its day a 
magnificent tree, the equal of its healthy, vigorous 
neighbors of the same age. It stands as proud and 
erect as ever, but unmistakable symptoms denote the 
consequences of advanced age and failing health. It 
wears the same familiar brownish-red corduroy coat 



144 YOSEMITE VALLEY 

of bark as when it was in the prime of life, but death 
has invaded the peripheral parts of its body and is 
gradually but surely advancing to more vital regions. 
Its circulation, once vigorous, has become enfeebled, 
and in many remote terminal districts it has been com- 
pletely suspended. The ground underneath the dying 
tree is strewn with dead leaves and branchlets and 
sequestrated bark. The debarked, lifeless, leafless 
limbs have been draped by kind neighbors in a sleeve 
of greenish yellow moss, a service which has done 
much in lessening the austerity and sadness of the 
scene of approaching death. Death has claimed the 
lower limbs and is gradually ascending, grasping limb 
after limb in its upward march. Not satisfied with its 
progress in that direction, it has selected a new point 
of attack. It has already destroyed the top of the 
beautiful spire. To the mast-like end of the trunk, 
the mutilated, naked, bleached limbs, devoid of 
branches, remain attached. The dead tree-top among 
the green-robed crowns of the vigorous neighbors 
presents a ghastly scene. What was once the proud, 
waving crown is now a naked skeleton. The decaying 
bark is loosening its hold on the lifeless limbs, and 
here and there trunk and limbs have been denuded by 
decortication wrought by death. Between the scenes 
of death above and below a few limbs remain in which 
life has been sustained by the enfeebled circulation. 
But it is plain enough that the struggle against death 
advancing in both directions will soon be over. The 
foliage has lost the hue of health. None of the leaves 
are healthy, all have lost their luster, and some of 
them are already wearing the dull yellow color of 
death, and are ready, during the next stiff breeze, to 



DEAD MONARCH OF SEQUOIAS OF MARIPOSA 145 

part' with the necrosed branchlet that will soon follow 
them to the last resting-place beneath at the very feet 
of the dying giant. Nothing can save the dying 
veteran. The cool, drizzling fall rains will have no 
influence in stimulating the flagging circulation. The 
chilling frosts and falling snow will not be felt by the 
dying cedar. The tree has escaped the woodman's 
ax, the fury of the storms, the arrows of lightning and 
the ravages of fire. It has enjoyed a long, useful, 
peaceful life, during which it exercised its many vir- 
tues, and is now dying inch by inch from the effects 
of a gradual decline of the vital forces incident to 
extreme old age. There is no possible hope of 
recovery even with a much mutilated body; the invalid 
has reached an age that sets a limit on all living 
things, and must yield to the inevitable. Elements, be 
kind to the dying veteran! May the cooling dew and 
the refreshing rains of approaching fall quench thirst; 
may the winds deal gently with the enfeebled invalid, 
and may the snow and ice of the coming winter not 
suffice to crush out life. Let death come slowly and 
imperceptibly, and let the final spark of life leave the 
massive body while it is warmed to the heart that had 
ceased to beat, by the Sun in the blue, cloudless, sum- 
mer sky. 

THE DEAD MONARCH OF THE SEQUOIAS OF MARIPOSA. 

Five years ago the monarch of the Mariposa Grove 
of Sequoias, after a long, useful, virtuous life, unex- 
pectedly, suddenly and without any apparent provoca- 
tion, severed his connection with the soil that had 
nourished him so well and so long, and fell helpless, 
crashing through the branches of his loyal neighbors, 



146 YO SEMITE VALLEY 

and struck the ground with a heavy, dull thud that 
made the earth tremble and the mountains re-echo the 
report of his death. For ages he had been the 
acknowledged ruler of his tribe. He was the veteran 
among the veterans, and the giant of the giant race. 
Could this dead monarch speak, what a history he 
could relate! During his lifetime nations have come 
and disappeared, empires have been built and de- 
stroyed. He was old when Rome was a wilderness and 
the children of Israel were on their way to the Land 
of Promise. He was classed with the veterans when 
Columbus discovered the land he had a right to call 
his own. Could he but speak, he could tell us all 
there is to be known of the prehistoric races of 
America and their migration from north to south. He 
could relate to us the story of the Indians, their origin, 
their early habits, their virtues and vices. He could 
give us a reliable description of animals that inhabited 
his kingdom, which have disappeared from the face of 
the earth and whose fossil remains now perplex our 
men of science. He could speak authoritatively con- 
cerning the history of his own noble race; how, in the 
course of thousands of years, it had been reduced from 
a mighty nation to a few family groups. Could he 
but speak, he could give us all that has transpired in 
his own family during the last five thousand years. 
,But he is dead, prostrate on the ground. The weary 
body has at last found rest on the friendly bed of his 
native soil. Thousands of visitors walk annually over 
the mammoth body to obtain a more accurate idea of 
the enormity of its size. It has supported a stage- 
coach crowded with passengers to which four horses 
were attached. The elements are dealing gently with 



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DEAD MONARCH OP SEQUOIAS OF MARIPOSA 147 

the remains of this monarch. He wears the same 
rough vestment as he did during life. The head has 
lost its green crown, but the skeleton, mutilated by 
the inevitable consequences of old age and by the 
heavy fall, remains. Coming generations will make 
pilgrimages to the fallen monarch to view his remains, 
and when they have seen him, and the giant survivors 
of his imperial race standing guard over the dead, and 
the primeval forest of which they form the crowning 
part, they will be prepared to acknowledge the force 
and truth of the sentiment: 

"Nature, the vicar of the Almighty Lord." 

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